"Humans are born as atheists"

[9-10ths_Penguin]

There is a god?

What's a god?

 

[Jumi]

ATHEIST

noun
1. a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings.
Source: Dictionary.com

n
(Philosophy) a person who does not believe in God or gods
Source: Collins English Dictionary

Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
Source: American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition

n.
a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being.
Source: Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary,

n.
someone who believes that God does not exist
Source:Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary

noun
A person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods:
Source: Oxford Dictionaries​

.

1. Denies or disbelieves. First is strong atheist, second is weak atheist. Supreme being or beings is a lacking definition since there are more types of gods.

2. Does not believe can mean either active or passive.

3. Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods. Better definition.

4. Again, two different views are presented. Strong and weak atheism.

5. Only strong atheism is presented here. This would make many people who term themselves atheists something else, which is what?

6. Disbelieves or lacks belief. Seems redundant since disbelief can be active or passive.

 

[Jumi]

When was the first Atheist born? The Atheists cannot tell.

How would this be relevant if the question could be answered?

They have to provide evidence as they would require of the Believers of G-d.

Did you believe in god before you were taught about your religion?

And we know religion is not on their side.

That would depend on the religion.

 

[Willamena]

You think theism is one idea?

No, it's ANY idea about gods. Could be one.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Sure we can. It's done all the time. One doesn't need absolute proof or even a smattering of evidence of every possible form of god. Just as I don't need need absolute proof or even a smattering of evidence of every conceivable type of flying unicorn in order to deny their existence. And although you may feel that all that's necessary to be an atheist is to lack a belief in god, I side with the dictionaries, which look at atheism as a chosen position of either outright denial, or disbelief.

I'm not even talking about a lack of evidence; I'm talking about a lack of concept. We can only reject the existence of a flying unicorn because we can conceive of a flying unicorn. To evaluate a proposition as false, we need a proposition to evaluate.

But you disagree... so please: tell us how you reject an idea that has never even entered your mind.

- 2 1 explicitly include "lack of belief". Points for the reasonable side. I'll grant you the 1 out of 6. The 1 that also mentions "disbelieves."

2. "Does not believe" describes lack of belief.

- 4 include "disbelief". Look that up - the dictionaries I'm familiar with include lack of belief in their definition of disbelief. More points for the reasonable side. Irrelevant. See above

Ah - you don't understand how definitions work. Your loss.

- 2 assume monotheism ("supreme being" or "God") and can be safely rejected by anyone who realizes that polytheists aren't atheists. Irrelevant.

So you think that polytheists who reject God but believe in gods are atheists? Weird... and more to the point, this is not how the rest of the word uses the word "atheist".

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

No, it's ANY idea about gods. Could be one.

Are you trying to argue that a person who rejects any god is an atheist, or did you just walk into the middle of a conversation without realizing the context?

 

[Willamena]

Are you trying to argue that a person who rejects any god is an atheist, or did you just walk into the middle of a conversation without realizing the context?

If you've only been exposed to one god or gods and reject it, you're an atheist. Any god or gods.

 

[Katzpur]

I'm sure there's a reason we don't remember much from our early years. We didn't have the framework to hold on to memories the same way we started holding them after around the same time as developing capacity for language.

So wouldn't it make sense that, if this framework didn't exist at birth, it would also be impossible for us to remember events prior to our birth?

Well I'm interested if someone can say they remember things before birth if they can claim to know those things?

Well, I'm sure you won't find anyone who will make this claim. Religious people do, of course, make many claims they can't prove. And I, for one, have no interest in trying to, or in trying to convince anyone else to believe as I do. Furthermore, I don't think you're going to find any Christians aside from Mormons who do believe in a pre-earth existence. Biblically, the doctrine can be argued, but since that's not what this thread is even about, I'll leave it for another time.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

If you've only been exposed to one god or gods and reject it, you're an atheist. Any god or gods.

Virtually every theist rejects at least one god.

 

[Willamena]

Virtually every theist rejects at least one god.

Virtually every smoker rejects some cigarettes. It's what they do smoke that makes them smokers.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Virtually every smoker rejects some cigarettes. It's what they do smoke that makes them smokers.

That's what I'm saying. Rejecting one cigarette doesn't make you a smoker; rejecting one god (if we're going to try to define atheism in terms of rejection) doesn't make you an atheist.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Virtually every smoker rejects some cigarettes. It's what they do smoke that makes them smokers.

Actually, this is a useful analogy:

A person can be a non-smoker without necessarily being a non-smoker on principle. All you need to do to be a smoker is just not smoke. Likewise, all you need to do to be an atheist is not believe in any gods... and a baby doesn't smoke or believe in gods, so a baby is a non-smoker and an atheist.

 

[Willamena]

That's what I'm saying. Rejecting one cigarette doesn't make you a smoker; rejecting one god (if we're going to try to define atheism in terms of rejection) doesn't make you an atheist.

Except the comparison was to theists, not atheists.

A person is a (hard) non-smoker for giving up what they did smoke, not what they didn't.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Except the comparison was to theists, not atheists.

And I contend that theists aren't atheists. Do you disagree?

 

[Willamena]

And I contend that theists aren't atheists. Do you disagree?

I give up.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

No, I'm sorry, but they aren't. I have no idea where this idea could have come from other then poor reasoning or ignorance of psychology. The entire concept of there being or not being a god is abstract, and requires abstract reasoning. An object that cannot think about such questions, such as plants, would never be considered atheists with intellectual honesty. Yet babies are the same way, entirely mechanistic and bound to conditioning et al, unable to even understand that their parents can be wrong about things. They can only even understand the concept of right and wrong, on their own, once abstract reasoning begins to develop (7-12). I'd go as far as to say a first grader rambling about Jesus is not even Christian, they're simply running on a program. If I make a program that always responds to questions from an atheistic perspective, the program and computer are still not atheists.

Beside the simple fact that kids have no idea what we're even really discussing, the fact is that atheism requires making a judgement call. I'm not saying anything more than atheists consciously weight evidence and arguments to decided there probably is no god, so please save the straw men. A baby cannot make a judgement call, as we said they can't even really grapple with morality and values anyway. If you explain the cosmological argument to a baby, and explain why it's invalid/valid, they won't understand. They're incapable. They're going to **** their pants then wander the room aimlessly. While I'd love to make a joke right now, this is not what the atheist does.

I think that babies are atheists because I think that all a person needs to do to be an atheist is to not be a theist.

What do you think a person needs to do to be an atheist?

 

[Jumi]

So wouldn't it make sense that, if this framework didn't exist at birth, it would also be impossible for us to remember events prior to our birth?

Yes it would, but not if my guess is wrong or our memories can somehow exist outside of our biological constraints.

Well, I'm sure you won't find anyone who will make this claim. Religious people do, of course, make many claims they can't prove. And I, for one, have no interest in trying to, or in trying to convince anyone else to believe as I do. Furthermore, I don't think you're going to find any Christians aside from Mormons who do believe in a pre-earth existence. Biblically, the doctrine can be argued, but since that's not what this thread is even about, I'll leave it for another time.

I know the parts of the Bible used to argue for pre-existence since I've commented in a debate about it. I didn't know Mormons believed in pre-existence... that's interesting.

I actually have found people who make the claim that they remember past lives or prelife. They usually don't like to discuss such things, especially on open forums. At least some of them believe they've experienced something or remember something and I'm always curious to challenge my views... preferably by practical experiments. I've even attempted to remember, but at a certain point the "film stops" and the mind starts making things up.

 

[Yerda]

What's a god?

What theists believe exists.

 

[Jumi]

I give up.

There's always what I proposed in another thread that we start saying which gods we are atheists towards and which gods we are theists... of course it was met with surprising amount of ridicule, but the present discussion says that the terms are still about as useless as ever.

 

[Maponos]

Isn't it more interesting that most don't? If atheism is a religion, then religion is meaningless as a term. Even when I identified as atheist it had zero religious quality to it, or about the same as my lack of interest in learning the Windows 8 interface. Though it was common for people on the forum to say I belong to this religion called atheism and claims that I liked various things about New Atheism which I don't. I think I was more religious about other things, being a mystic you know.

Many people, like Richard Dawkins and his godsless congregation, cast doubt on this.

Anti-theism isn't a needed component of atheism though. Though it might be confusing, since many more vocal atheists are anti-theists.

I've had many encounters with many atheists and many are heavily condescending. The few I've met who aren't pseudo-religious barely bring it up- as it should be. One friend I have in particular always comments on how stupid religion or theism is whenever it is brought up. It's not hard to come to the conclusion that many atheists are like this when you've experienced it several times over.