Atheists and christmas

[bigboab]

For Chris.. sake. You are still picking out the parts that suit you. There is nobody arguing about your interpretation of religion. We are just saying that there are others.

Please excuse any typing errors. It is old age(The keyboard I mean) My birthday is due in about 10 weeks.

Proof please. Talk about guesswork and speculation

What about the Moonies. They have a God.

There are hundreds of different religions in this world. Each one thinks that they are the right one. They can't all be correct, then again it is possible that they could all be wrong.

Every person should be left to their own beliefs. If you don't agree with this and interfere with others beliefs then you must be willing to take the flak that will ensue.

Don't know about the moonies but if they have a god they are not atheist (if that is what u r saying). I don't care what you believe. You are entitled to live your life the way u want. You can believe cows lay eggs if you want. That doesn't make it true. You can believe atheism is a religion if that makes u feel better, but that doesn't make it true.

Theirs is a self ordained God Sun Myung Moon.
Moonie (plural Moonies) is a term which refers to members of the Unification Church; it is derived from the name of church founder. for some reason or other it is defined as a cult. I thought all religions were cults. I know we wear cults(Sorry Kev)

[ugk4life]

Yeah, wouldn't all religions be classified as cults? I've never understood the derogatory use of the term cult.

[bigboab]

cult (k¾lt) n. 1.a. A religion or religious sect generally considered to be extremist or false, with its followers often living in an unconventional manner under the guidance of an authoritarian, charismatic leader. b. The followers of such a religion or sect. 2. A system or community of religious worship and ritual. 3. The formal means of expressing religious reverence; religious ceremony and ritual. 4. A usually nonscientific method or regimen claimed by its originator to have exclusive or exceptional power in curing a particular disease. 5.a. Obsessive, especially faddish, devotion to or veneration for a person, principle, or thing. b. The object of such devotion. 6. An exclusive group of persons sharing an esoteric, usually artistic or intellectual interest. --attributive. Often used to modify another noun: a cult figure; cult films. [Latin cultus, worship, from past participle of colere, to cultivate.
American Heritage Dictionary

Depends who wrote the dictionary. A lot of religions burnt any book(or person) that did not agree with their particular doctrine. I suppose this was one way to say 'our word is the truth'.

[devilsadvocate]

You say Atheist don't believe because they have no proof, however an Atheist can believe in men from mars without proof.

Proof please. Talk about guesswork and speculation

Again you appear to have missed the point.

An Atheist cannot believe in God and still be an Atheist, I'll take a leap and assume we both agree on that.

You said Atheist don't believe in God because there is no proof of his existence. You said that they trust in science and God has not been proven scientifically (words to that effect).

The point is about the scientific part of your statement being the essential reasoning. An Atheist can ("can" doesn't mean "does") believe in men from Mars despite there being no scientific evidence or proof and still be an Atheist. Ergo belief, trust or faith in scientific theory is irrelevant to being an Atheist.

[ugk4life]

Proof please. Talk about guesswork and speculation

Again you appear to have missed the point.

An Atheist cannot believe in God and still be an Atheist, I'll take a leap and assume we both agree on that.

You said Atheist don't believe in God because there is no proof of his existence. You said that they trust in science and God has not been proven scientifically (words to that effect).

The point is about the scientific part of your statement being the essential reasoning. An Atheist can ("can" doesn't mean "does") believe in men from Mars despite there being no scientific evidence or proof and still be an Atheist. Ergo belief, trust or faith in scientific theory is irrelevant to being an Atheist.

Again, proof, or at least a better explanation. You made something up off the top of your head! We can deal in hypothetical all day, the point is atheist don't believe in god b/c there is no proof.

[j2k4]

So then:

What sort of "proof" is required in order to refer to, well, any endeavor (not involving a deity) as one a person might be said to pursue with a "religious fervor"?

Or have you single-handedly stricken that from the previously available list of adjectival stuffs.

[Snee]

Again you appear to have missed the point.

An Atheist cannot believe in God and still be an Atheist, I'll take a leap and assume we both agree on that.

You said Atheist don't believe in God because there is no proof of his existence. You said that they trust in science and God has not been proven scientifically (words to that effect).

The point is about the scientific part of your statement being the essential reasoning. An Atheist can ("can" doesn't mean "does") believe in men from Mars despite there being no scientific evidence or proof and still be an Atheist. Ergo belief, trust or faith in scientific theory is irrelevant to being an Atheist.

Again, proof, or at least a better explanation. You made something up off the top of your head! We can deal in hypothetical all day, the point is atheist don't believe in god b/c there is no proof.

A proper atheist believes there is no God. And that's pretty much the definition of what some people call a strong atheist.

An agnostic thinks we can't be sure whether there's a God or not, since there's no proof either way.

Sometimes agnostics are described as weak atheists, but that's pretty much misleading and a bit insulting to agnostics, since people who label themselves atheists tend to be a pack of morons who sit around in discussion groups on the internet discussing counter-arguments to people arguing there's a God and whatnot, and they hardly bring very good arguments for anything related to theism, either. Agnostics, on the other hand, tend to have at least tried to think things through, and they don't generally go around going 'hurf blurf, I'm an agnostic' or try and turn discussions about religion into arguments about whether there's a God.

In short, there's very little difference between internets-atheists and internets-preachers, and neither group seems to have thought things through.

Here, go read wikipedia.

Incidentally, that article says that some Buddhists are sometimes referred to as atheists. This would be because they have a religion that excludes the existance of a God.

EDit:

In some respects that moron who wrote the OP's article is a poster-child for the kind of atheism I don't like. He both claims that the majority of the science world is atheist ('nor wound [sic] the majority of the science world') and manages to imply that to follow a religion, everyone has to follow it exactly the same.

And to top it off, I'm getting the impression he's gone onto a site where he expects that the people reading it don't subscribe to his particular brand of nonsense, so he's probably trying to preach a bit.

[ugk4life]

Again, proof, or at least a better explanation. You made something up off the top of your head! We can deal in hypothetical all day, the point is atheist don't believe in god b/c there is no proof.

A proper atheist believes there is no God. And that's pretty much the definition of what some people call a strong atheist.

An agnostic thinks we can't be sure whether there's a God or not, since there's no proof either way.

Sometimes agnostics are described as weak atheists, but that's pretty much misleading and a bit insulting to agnostics, since people who label themselves atheists tend to be a pack of morons who sit around in discussion groups on the internet discussing counter-arguments to people arguing there's a God and whatnot, and they hardly bring very good arguments for anything related to theism, either. Agnostics, on the other hand, tend to have at least tried to think things through, and they don't generally go around going 'hurf blurf, I'm an agnostic' or try and turn discussions about religion into arguments about whether there's a God.

In short, there's very little difference between internets-atheists and internets-preachers, and neither group seems to have thought things through.

Here, go read wikipedia.

Incidentally, that article says that some Buddhists are sometimes referred to as atheists. This would be because they have a religion that excludes the existance of a God.

EDit:

In some respects that moron who wrote the OP's article is a poster-child for the kind of atheism I don't like. He both claims that the majority of the science world is atheist ('nor wound [sic] the majority of the science world') and manages to imply that to follow a religion, everyone has to follow it exactly the same.

And to top it off, I'm getting the impression he's gone onto a site where he expects that the people reading it don't subscribe to his particular brand of nonsense, so he's probably trying to preach a bit.

Huh?

[Snee]

tl;dr version:

Your definition of what an atheist is is lacking and a bit off, what you're describing wrt not believing because there's no proof sounds more like agnosticism*. Your idea of what a religion is isn't entirely on target either.

And on a personal note, I consider most people who fancy themselves Atheists, especially on the internet, to be morons.

You really shouldn't ask for an explanation if you aren't able to read all the big words.

EDit:

Going 'there is no God', as a 'strong' () atheist would is as much an expression of a belief system as saying the opposite. And it really takes just one person to start a religion, while there's lots of them with the same beliefs, discussing those same beliefs on the internet, getting organised (and borrowing the same traditions, now), in this case.

*Some people, mainly in the atheist department, would say that you can be both religious and agnostic, or atheist and agnostic, but I disagree, as I consider agnosticism the absence of belief, in this instance, whereas the other two aren't.

[devilsadvocate]

Snee

I find your argument interesting, however in my personal view religion would require worship of some manner. Lacking an object of worship, be it a spiritual deity or an actual object like the sun or nature, in my mind Atheist gathering to discuss their non belief would be more akin to a book club or a political party.

Do you only consider most Atheist that discuss their views online morons or do you extend the label to people that believe in a God that push their beliefs?

I find that most people that try to debate the merits of a belief system other than their own tend to make bad arguments because they don't understand the other side or just lack enough knowledge to not make false assumptions.
A Christian explaining his beliefs makes a coherent argument. A Christian trying to explain why Islam, Buddhism or Atheism is incorrect usually makes a fool of himself. Part of it being because he usually couldn't do so without referring to his own religion as the proof. The same would apply to an Atheist.