Talk:Atheism
Attention atheists
Please provide proof and evidence that atheism is true. There is plenty of evidence for Christianity as can be seen HERE and HERE and no evidence atheism is true as can be seen HERE.
Then, please proceed HERE.
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'Attention atheists' message
There is a mistake in the text of your message. You should ask atheists for proof and evidence (by the way, aren't "proof" and "evidence" synonyms?) that atheism is true, not false. But then again, I am not sure that "true" and "false", as adjectives, can apply very well to "atheism", so I'd rather change it to "Please provide evidence against the existence of God", or to "Please provide evidence that atheism is logically justifiable". Also (but this is nitpicking), there is a full stop after the question mark. Please don't get me wrong, I am a devout Christian and I am applaud your crusade against atheism, but I just had some minor issues about the FORM of your message :) I did not correct the text of your message directly, because it is in a talk page, and not in a main page. Best regards, --Leo-from-UK 08:28, 17 June 2011 (EDT)
- Someone had changed the message. I changed it back. conservative
Atheism and Racism, new evidence (from Wikipedia)
Sociologist Phil Zuckerman analyzed previous social science research on secularity and non-belief, and concluded that societal well-being is positively correlated with irreligion. His findings relating specifically to atheism include:
Compared to religious people, "atheists and secular people" are less nationalistic, prejudiced, antisemitic, racist, dogmatic, ethnocentric, close-minded, and authoritarian.
In the US, in states with the highest percentages of atheists, the murder rate is lower than average. In the most religious US states, the murder rate is higher than average.
http://www.pitzer.edu/academics/faculty/zuckerman/Zuckerman_on_Atheism.pdf
- Zuckerman is a secular, that's the word Atheists use when they want to disguise their believes. Naturally an atheist says that societies are better off without religion, it's clear that this is not the case. Now pick up a history book and start educating yourself instead of believing atheist propaganda. --StevenAA 16:55, 8 July 2011 (EDT)
True, he is secular, but one is either secular or religious, and both sides have a stake in the argument - by your logic, no one can comment on the validity of statements regarding the characteristics of religious or non-religious people, since both a secular or non-secular commenter would want to slant the argument towards their point of view. What Zuckerman does do is lay out the results of previous studies, perform a meta-analysis, and draw reasonable conclusions from the results of his analysis. Mass murder (however sensational it is), does not speak to the question Zuckerman tries to answer with his study. I think a complete, non-biased discussion about the relationship between atheism and morality should include all of the studies that address the issue. After all, we should be teaching the controversy. --Stairmaster 21:50, 8 July 2011 (EDT)
- Secularism is the attempt to take religion out of everything, as Atheism doesn't see itself as a religion - actively attacking all other religions - it is clear that secularization actually means atheismization. Atheism is a religion. Quoting some falsy famous Atheist leaders who I fail to remember now "Religion is believe despite evidence" - Atheist believe despite the evidence for Christianity, they believe despite the evidence that evolution is false, they believe despite the evidence that the big bang did not occure, and son on in thousands of cases. Atheism is a religion even by the standards atheists use. Atheism is bad for society because atheism leaves no reason not to be selfish, not to follow the path Darwin described so pseudoscientifically. Atheism is all that what immorality means. Why don't we see this you might ask. Because Atheists know that they can't behave this way in a society that has Christian roots. They would be kicked out, they would not be tolerated, every smile from an atheist towards a Christian is fake, every friendly gesture is a trick to make us think they are good people. They are not, they are deeply selfish people that trick innocent Christians, Jews and all other people that don't suppress the knownledge that they are religious, every time they are friendly into thinking that they are friendly.
- Christians can know the truth, because they know that Christianity is true their basis of thinking is not contaminated by what is false. No matter if Atheists knownlingly lie to us or are just too indoctrinated or too stupid to see the truth how wrong they are, we shoot look twice at everything they say. And if an Atheist claims that Atheism makes for a better society he does not only meassure with his own Atheist instruments of "equality" and "social equality" which is problematic but also is he biased in his perseption of how good it actually is. Of course he will think that such a society is "better" (aside that the murder rates also stem from the fact that Scandinavians have no temper, which Americans have) simply because he is not reminded all the time how awefully wrong he is. You are naturally free as a member of a totalitarian state if you are an adherent to that ideology, you simply will not notice any difference.
- I sincerely hope you learned something today. --StevenAA 13:38, 9 July 2011 (EDT)
Atheism vs. Ponies page (should I post talk here?)
The talk page for the essay on Ponies vs. Atheism appears to be this talk page for the article on Atheism. I was going to add my two cents to the former talk page, but I guess it is intended that all talk for that essay is to be posted on this talk page for the article on Atheism. So, here's my two cents:
In psychological/social terms, atheism is defined as the negation of the most basic good sentiments that it is logically possible to have: good sentiments toward a good, overseeing Creator God. So, life is not about atheism. Which means atheism (especially strong atheism) is not an actual quality of good character, but, at best, a lack of certain good character. The fact that many theists are arrogant does not mean that theism is arrogance, but that theists tend to be fallen humans. Theism does not preclude arrogance on the part of the theist in terms of theism, but, neither does atheism preclude arrogance on the part of the atheist in terms of atheism.PatternOfPersona 19:54, 3 July 2011 (EDT)
"Weak" vs "Strong" atheism; Implicit vs Explicit, etc.
I wanted to add something like this, but can't because the page is locked. If an admin thinks it is a good idea, please add it:
- Many atheists like to make a distinction between strong atheism and weak atheism. They define strong atheism as believing God does not exist, while weak atheism as neither believing nor disbelieving. However, this usage is incorrect, and has been invented by atheists to boost their numbers. If you believe God does not exist, you are an atheist. If you neither believe nor disbelieve, you aren't an atheist, you are some kind of agnostic.
- Another distinction atheists like to propose is between implicit and explicit atheism. Explicit atheism means active conscious rejection of God's existence. "Implicit atheism" refers to having no belief in God, due to not being aware of the concept. Atheists use this to argue that "babies are atheists", again in order to boost their numbers. However, again, this is an abuse of terminology. "Implicit atheism" is not atheism. Babies, just because they haven't learnt the concept of "God" yet, are not atheists. To be an atheist, you must have encountered the idea of "God", and chosen to reject it. A baby isn't even an agnostic, since an agnostic has encountered the idea, and isn't personally sure whether it is right, or even thinks we'll never know if it is. A baby hasn't encountered the idea yet.
- Another specious atheist argument is "Christians are atheists about all Gods but one". But this ignores that god is used in two different ways. Little-g god, refers to a limited being, like the gods of mythology, with immense but not absolute power. It is possible for multiple such limited beings to exist. Capital-G God, refers to an omnipotent being, as conceived in religions such as Judaism and Christianity. It is impossible for there to exist more than one omnipotent being - what happens if two omnipotent beings have a disagreement? So, Zeus is not comparable to the Christian God, and the Christian's disbelief in Zeus is not a form of atheism.
What do people think? I think this is a good way to address some common atheist distortions. Of course, maybe it could be worded better, feel free to edit it if someone decides to... Maratrean 16:50, 6 July 2011 (EDT)
- I think we do a good enough job on the definition of atheism and we also link to Creation Ministries International's atheism article which goes into the implicit vs. explicit atheism issue. I think where Conservapedia could be stronger is the "Atheism is a religion" issue. Like this material: http://creation.com/atheism-a-religion except summarized and compact. Also, courts have called atheism a religion. conservative 19:41, 6 July 2011 (EDT)
- Here is what Conservapedia has now: http://www.conservapedia.com/Atheism_is_a_religion Except for another topic I want to add later which I have referred to as the pièce de résistance I don't want the article to get much bigger as I believe it is a large article although it is an organized article that hits the main/common/interesting points that are or can be raised about this topic. I really like the wiki software in that it creates a table of contents so people can read what they want to read easily. I hit the print preview on Firefox 5.0 and it says the article is 63 pages long if printed out. It is probably Conservapedia's largest article. conservative 19:49, 6 July 2011 (EDT)
- I understand your logic, the article is big already and you don't want it to get bigger, that makes sense. Do you think the points I made would fit in another article, maybe one of the other articles the site has about atheism, or else a brand new one (e.g. "Definition of atheism")? And then I guess, this can be the main atheism article, and it can link to various subarticles, for people interested in more detail on specific points about atheism. Maratrean 15:30, 7 July 2011 (EDT)
- Here is what Conservapedia has now: http://www.conservapedia.com/Atheism_is_a_religion Except for another topic I want to add later which I have referred to as the pièce de résistance I don't want the article to get much bigger as I believe it is a large article although it is an organized article that hits the main/common/interesting points that are or can be raised about this topic. I really like the wiki software in that it creates a table of contents so people can read what they want to read easily. I hit the print preview on Firefox 5.0 and it says the article is 63 pages long if printed out. It is probably Conservapedia's largest article. conservative 19:49, 6 July 2011 (EDT)
- Expanding Definition of atheism sounds good. I will get a clip of William Lane Craig challenging atheist Christopher Hitchens on the definition of atheism once you complete the article which I predict will be a popular article. Hitchens claimed his earphone didn't work and got nervous. Even an atheist said Dr. Craig "spanked Hitchen's like a foolish child" at the debate. [1] Conservative 06:44, 8 July 2011 (EDT)
- Hi Conservative, please see I have added my content to the Definition of atheism article. Please let me know if there is anything I could improve. I think your clip sounds good. The reality is, William Lane Craig is a professional philosopher, Christopher Hitchens is a dilettante journalist. I think, if atheists want to debate Craig, they need to find people on Craig's own level, or else they'll just get steamrollered. I never watched that debate, but I've seen others - like a video of this atheist geologist who debated Craig, and I really felt sorry for the guy, because Craig was just wiping the floor with him. Maratrean 18:34, 8 July 2011 (EDT)
- I think we do a good enough job on the definition of atheism and we also link to Creation Ministries International's atheism article which goes into the implicit vs. explicit atheism issue. I think where Conservapedia could be stronger is the "Atheism is a religion" issue. Like this material: http://creation.com/atheism-a-religion except summarized and compact. Also, courts have called atheism a religion. conservative 19:41, 6 July 2011 (EDT)