Atheism: Belief or not a belief?

Wow, this thread really did take off. I guess that's understandable seeing as how most of us are here for religious/spiritual reasons anyway.

Kyrin Wyldstar wrote: To say "There are no Gods" is a belief. But this is not atheism. Since you can never prove there are no Gods it becomes a belief and could possibly even be construed as a worldview.

But to say "I don't accept the existence of a God because there is no evidence to support it" is a position on a single issue. Its not a belief and its not a world view. This is the default stance on any single issue. If I say I have an invisible purple unicorn in my garage, your default position is to not believe me unless I can prove to you that I, in fact, do have an invisible purple unicorn in my garage. This is the premise that not only Atheism but any logical process operates under. An atheist takes the default option of disbelief in the claim that a God exists, not that no Gods exist no matter what.

That's a very comprehensive comparison of the two kind of atheism. I agree with what someone said about Christians always trying to convert atheists. One of the two people I like to watch on periscope is Matt Cawthorn, a former Lutheran turned atheist. He's very knowledgeable and friendly in his approach to the beliefs of others. I highly recommend him if you're into periscope. He always has Christians on there trying to convince him that he's wrong. It really is quite entertaining.

I have experienced unexplainable phenomena at various times in my life as well as visions (drug induced and sleepy dream variety) where I communicated with being that are not of this world. I cannot explain most of what I've seen, let alone prove that it was real. Scientifically speaking, I would say that none of it actually happened, but that doesn't mean that it isn't real in some sense. It's real to me and that's why I believe in it. All belief is subjective. Did we really lands on the moon? How do you know? Faith. Did the Egyptians build the pyramids or find them? Are all the hieroglyphics factual? Faith. Does God exist? Faith is required to answer all these questions. As such, agnostic is the only valid "default belief" as I see it. Atheism is just another way of dealing with the concept of God by saying, "nope."

Edan, when you don't care if there is a god or not it's called "Apatheism". Welcome to the flock of DGAF.

Atheism is absolutely a system of belief since it cannot stand alone with evidence and proof. You can neither prove the existence or non-existence of a deity with 100% certainty.

But you certainly CAN not care one way or the other. hahaha

Oh, and nobody "ran" Mahogany off; she wasn't a martyr. She tucked tail and ran all on her own.

Did nobody from the second wave of these posts read the first waves discussion?

rugadd wrote: Did nobody from the second wave of these posts read the first waves discussion?

I can only speak for myself, but I skipped most of it. I might have made it to page two? Not meaning any disrespect by the lengthy and well-reasoned responses that people gave, but I got places to go and things to do, so I addressed the points that I wanted to address and left it at that.

rugadd wrote: Did nobody from the second wave of these posts read the first waves discussion?

I did!!!! :laugh:

rugadd wrote: Did nobody from the second wave of these posts read the first waves discussion?

Does it matter? Stop trying to control me man!