Remind me again why I came?

[Ellainix]

If horseback riding was a religion I would be a follower  

[happynewyear]

I would agree with most of the comments made above, except for one.
I think that Atheism is a religion.

Welcome to the forum...but I think you are misusing the word religion.

Thank you for the welcome.
When I use the word religion I am using it in it's literal sense, as in "to connect" or "to join together".
This forum and Atheism in general, is a "joining together" of like-minded people.(coming from very diverse backgrounds)
I have found that, using the structure which defines a religion, useful when explaining Atheism to theist friends.
I know, that lots of Atheists reject the comparison with organised religion, but I do not have a problem with it.

[happynewyear]

Atheism is based on a belief system (belief in the non existence of God)

Actually, no it's not having a belief in a god...an atheist may or may not think it is right to say that a god definitely can't exist.

Would you agree, that in order to have no belief in a god,  you must first have a "concept" of what you are rejecting?

[Whitney]

I have found that, using the structure which defines a religion, useful when explaining Atheism to theist friends.

How can you find it useful when theists tend to associate religion with having faith?


I still disagree and think it is a misuse of the word....your definition is not the "literal" meaning of religion and makes every sort of coming together of people for any purpose a religion effectively making religion synonymous with club.

[Whitney]

Would you agree, that in order to have no belief in a god,  you must first have a "concept" of what you are rejecting?

Not necessarily...babies don't believe in god.

[Shine]

Ah, but as a Texan, you must know that Football is the established state religion.  lol

[happynewyear]

Would you agree, that in order to have no belief in a god,  you must first have a "concept" of what you are rejecting?

Not necessarily...babies don't believe in god.

You are making an assumption here. How do you know that babies don't believe in god?

[happynewyear]

Atheism has a hierarchy of "Priests"(Darwin, Hawkins, Dennett etc)

What?  I don't even know how to respond to that other than that no atheist has to accept evolution nor the philosophical musings of other atheists.

I know theists, who believe, that their creation myth is but a story and that their "priests" talk the biggest load of nonsense.

[elliebean]

What?  I don't even know how to respond to that other than that no atheist has to accept evolution nor the philosophical musings of other atheists.

I know theists who believe that their creation myth is only a story and that their "priests" talk a lot of nonsense.

So? That just makes them religious heretics.

There are no heretics in atheism, becasue there is no dogma.

So, is a lack of belief in smurfs also a religion?

You are making an assumption here. How do you know that babies don't believe in god?

I conducted a poll. The results showed that 95.6% of newborn babies have never even heard of god. The rest of them were deaf.

[Shine]

When I use the word religion I am using it in it's literal sense, as in "to connect" or "to join together".

I think that this is the core of the misconception.  You are using an nonstandard definition for religion which, quite honestly, is so ambiguous that it really renders the word itself meaningless.  If we define "religion" as a cause that connects or joins people together, we must then label Team Edward, American Idol, and all professional sport franchises as religions also.

Also, babies don't believe in god because they lack object permanence until around age two.  This is why the game peek-a-boo works: the baby does not believe that you exist if you momentarily cover your face with your hands.  How could we possibly expect a baby to believe in something that they have never even seen if they cease to believe in objects which leave their field of vision?

[Whitney]

Would you agree, that in order to have no belief in a god,  you must first have a "concept" of what you are rejecting?

Not necessarily...babies don't believe in god.

You are making an assumption here. How do you know that babies don't believe in god?

You haven't been around many young children, have you?

Atheism has a hierarchy of "Priests"(Darwin, Hawkins, Dennett etc)

What?  I don't even know how to respond to that other than that no atheist has to accept evolution nor the philosophical musings of other atheists.

I know theists, who believe, that their creation myth is but a story and that their "priests" talk the biggest load of nonsense.

so?...that has nothing to do with what I was commenting on.

[i_am_i]

You are making an assumption here. How do you know that babies don't believe in god?

Well what do you think? Do babies believe in God? Do babies even have the mental capacity to believe? Every baby I've ever seen was just a little eating, pissing and shitting quasi-ambulatory vegetable that vaguely resembled a human being.

[Tanker]

Would you agree, that in order to have no belief in a god,  you must first have a "concept" of what you are rejecting?

Not necessarily...babies don't believe in god.

You are making an assumption here. How do you know that babies don't believe in god?

I'm sorry to say you have seriously hurt your future credability with this statement.

Babies are not sentient. Babies don't even have the basic understanding that they exist. At birth human children are nearly a complete blank slate and untill about 2 (give or take) don't have any understanding of self.

Unless you have some knowedge that every doctor, psycologist, scienist, or simply mothers do not?

[Magdalena]

The  original questions were:
There is no god.  Is there another common belief atheist share? Or…
Is part of being an atheist having no common beliefs aside from the obvious one?
As an atheist do I belong to a group and if I do, what is our purpose?

Is part of being an atheist having such divided points of view? Free thinking is fine with me. After all, there is no scriptures to follow, a leader to guide us, a building to meet so we can talk or learn about it.  Perhaps atheism is just a  way to simplify our already complicated lives.

In this forum, we’re free to follow our own ideas, make our own decisions, make comments that will make any religious person run to a temple and pray we all go to hell and burn at a much higher temperature than the normal sinner. This is a place were we’ll  be herd and respected which is something religious people don’t do.

If someone thinks a baby believes in god, and another one thinks he/she has enough scientific proof to show this is not the case, let them, after all, all they are doing is thinking and sharing. There’s no need for sarcasm, any idea is worth listening to.  If we disagree, we must listen carefully to know exactly what it is we don’t agree on, if we don’t, we’ll be doing the same thing THEY are doing, condemning others for their beliefs.

[Magdalena]

:hmm: "Religion]