Various kinds of Atheism

[Samael_Khan]

Various kinds of Atheism

I had to post this in the 'General Religious' debates section because this debate is intended for anybody to respond to.

A thread about various churches within Christianity has led on to this question.
I cannot think of many kinds of Atheism myself, but here is my short list.
Please do add to the list, argue about it, deny bits of it....... as you please.

Religious Atheism (Henotheism. Christianity. etc )
Implicit Atheism (I don't see how God could be real)
Direct Atheism (There is no God!)
Religion Mythers (God and everything in the bible etc is myth!)
Deism (God is unaware and uninvolved, so there is no Theistic God)
Agnosticism (I don't believe in God but am open minded)
Apatheism (I don't actually care about God, one way or t'other)
Ignosticism/Igtheism. (I don't accept any ideas or definitions about God.

Over to you all.......

New atheists? Militant atheists?

 

[oldbadger]

New atheists? Militant atheists?

They can go on the list, imo.
I suppose that militant atheism has shown itself before now.
New atheism.... Would they be converts? Imagine that, converted to atheism.

 

[Heyo]

The first time I read Anselm's argument I said phooey! and concerned myself with the details only lightly. These days I start in my usual place ─ what real quality does Anselm intend to denote when he says 'great' and 'greater' in this context?

My reaction was similar. I just thought "he is trying to define god into existence". But then again, that is what ideals are, definitions of ideal objects that can only have approximated representations in reality. But except from Anselm and to an extend Aquinas no theologian has gone that route. (At least none that I know of.)

 

[Earthtank]

Various kinds of Atheism

I had to post this in the 'General Religious' debates section because this debate is intended for anybody to respond to.

A thread about various churches within Christianity has led on to this question.
I cannot think of many kinds of Atheism myself, but here is my short list.
Please do add to the list, argue about it, deny bits of it....... as you please.

Religious Atheism (Henotheism. Christianity. etc )
Implicit Atheism (I don't see how God could be real)
Direct Atheism (There is no God!)
Religion Mythers (God and everything in the bible etc is myth!)
Deism (God is unaware and uninvolved, so there is no Theistic God)
Agnosticism (I don't believe in God but am open minded)
Apatheism (I don't actually care about God, one way or t'other)
Ignosticism/Igtheism. (I don't accept any ideas or definitions about God.

Over to you all.......

Primo GIF

 

[Valjean]

They can go on the list, imo.
I suppose that militant atheism has shown itself before now.
New atheism.... Would they be converts? Imagine that, converted to atheism.

Wouldn't militancy and be a feature of several kinds of atheism, rather than a kind in itself?
And "new atheism? Does it have any unique, definitive features?

 

[blü 2]

My reaction was similar. I just thought "he is trying to define god into existence". But then again, that is what ideals are, definitions of ideal objects that can only have approximated representations in reality. But except from Anselm and to an extend Aquinas no theologian has gone that route. (At least none that I know of.)

Yes, ideals, abstractions, pure concepts. With no real counterpart.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I went to a buffet, and, while eating, two reverends were dining together. One was selling his ministry, and the other was buying it. It was very important for the new minister to make strange movements and hand gestures, because in order to get their parishioners to part with mammon, they had to be convinced that it was God speaking through the ministers to the people. So, the two reverends were rehearsing how to fool the people who put their faith in them.

It was clear that the two reverends were atheists. They had attended divinity school, as atheists, with the idea to bilk a lot of mammon from people behaving like hapless sheep. They were their con artist marks....their pigeons....their targets.

When phony reverends are torn down (like Reverend Tex Watson of the murderous Manson Family, and Reverend Jim Bakker, and Reverend Jimmy Swaggart), it hurts religion, because it destroys the faith that people had in God. Losing faith in one's minister causes one to lose faith in God and faith in the religion. Many turned away from the teachings of Jesus because they no longer had faith that they were on the right path.

It is far more honest for an atheist to admit that he/she is an atheist rather than bilking money from the naive people who blindly give.

Ugh.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

And one of the problems @oldbadger has with the definition. He's a deist, so he's without theism. But then the atheists move the goalposts and say "atheism is not believing in any gods". So he is stuck between those two definitions.

My type of atheism only accepts people I can have a yarn with, so @oldbadger is in, regardless of his beliefs on this God person I hear so much about.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Various kinds of Atheism

Denominations/Sects of Atheism are on the increase to the liking or disliking of the Atheism people, they cannot stop it, as I understand.
For example if one states one's religion as "Christian Atheist" etc., it adds one denomination/sect to Christianity as well as one denomination/sect to Atheism. Right?
It is an individuals prerogative to declare one religion as per the
"The Universal Declaration of Human Rights":

Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Right?
And no "ism" or "ianity" can deny this right to an individual, please.
Right?

Regards

Individuals can call themselves whatever they like.
As a plain old atheist, I get much more agitated by other atheists dressing up atheism to be more than it is, than I do by non-atheists doing it.

It's just atheism. By all means, chuck whatever other beliefs you have on top of it, but don't act as if the 'whole' is atheism.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Atheism : disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.

So no gods, no false gods, no true gods.

One cannot say they believe in any gods and also say they are atheist

I tread that line carefully when it comes to Larry Bird. But basically I agree.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Oh... Wow!
Anti-Theism can go on the list.
That really sounds much more aggressive than 'atheism'.

Atheists just sit at home and watch telly...whatever.
Anti-Theists are out there being a nuisance.

New title.....

Don't be so quick to be sure. I'm a nuisance (as you know!!) but am certainly not an anti theist. Although I am anti-certain-religious-beliefs. And anti-certain-non-religious-beliefs.

But mostly just a nuisance.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I need to stop making **** up.

Nah...make even more up, and describe yourself as a 'creative muse versed at looking beyond realities constraints'.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

FWIW, that does not reflect the word's etymology which is athe(os) + ism, rather than a-theism.

So it doesn't contain theism in the same sense amoral contains moral for example.

The 2 terms are

Theos + ism
Atheos + ism

I agree it's a position though as all -isms are positions/beliefs/ideologies AFAIK.

It's also a position that requires some basic context, since a modern 'atheist' is somewhat different to what it originally was.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

If we're talking about real (non-imaginary) gods, it's worse than that ─ I don't even know what I'm supposed to be without.

And as far as I can tell, no one else does either,

Without recognition or worship of Gods, is the somewhat ham-fisted definition I run with. Their existence is somewhat beside the point...although possibly not to them!

 

[blü 2]

Without recognition or worship of Gods, is the somewhat ham-fisted definition I run with. Their existence is somewhat beside the point...although possibly not to them!

Yes, that's atheism.

But we ignostics don't get that far ─ we say, ahm, in real terms, what's a god? And in real terms, no one seems to know. Me neither.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Yes, that's atheism.

But we ignostics don't get that far ─ we say, ahm, in real terms, what's a god? And in real terms, no one seems to know. Me neither.

I have no idea what a God is either. But I refuse to call myself an ignostic. I get enough weird questions just calling myself an atheist, without encouraging next level 'WTF are you talking about?' questions.

 

[Heyo]

Yes, that's atheism.

But we ignostics don't get that far

I think we go further than the atheists. I/Agnosticism is far more radical than simple atheism. Atheists, by denying/questioning gods existence pretend to know what a god is and thereby grant the believers the illusion that they know what a god is.
I have all the arguments atheists use up my sleeve once the believers come up with a definition but usually they already fail at step one.
And we have a position. We have a world view to defend whereas the atheists just have a personal opinion.

 

[Samael_Khan]

They can go on the list, imo.
I suppose that militant atheism has shown itself before now.
New atheism.... Would they be converts? Imagine that, converted to atheism.

From what I understand, New Atheism is the reinforcement of hard atheism and there are many popular proponents of it in the world, such as Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins.

 

[Heyo]

From what I understand, New Atheism is the reinforcement of hard atheism and there are many popular proponents of it in the world, such as Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins.

The "new atheists" aren't hard atheists, what's new about them is that they are quite outspoken about it.

 

[Heyo]

Various kinds of Atheism

I had to post this in the 'General Religious' debates section because this debate is intended for anybody to respond to.

A thread about various churches within Christianity has led on to this question.
I cannot think of many kinds of Atheism myself, but here is my short list.
Please do add to the list, argue about it, deny bits of it....... as you please.

Religious Atheism (Henotheism. Christianity. etc )
Implicit Atheism (I don't see how God could be real)
Direct Atheism (There is no God!)
Religion Mythers (God and everything in the bible etc is myth!)
Deism (God is unaware and uninvolved, so there is no Theistic God)
Agnosticism (I don't believe in God but am open minded)
Apatheism (I don't actually care about God, one way or t'other)
Ignosticism/Igtheism. (I don't accept any ideas or definitions about God.

Over to you all.......

There was, for a short time, a movement that called itself atheism+ (atheism plus). But they couldn't agree on what the "plus" should be and so they dissolved.