muichimotsu
Holding All and None
To make this more accessible and less heavy on complex philosophical investigation, I thought it better to make a topic to allow people to contribute their thoughts on what they think atheism is and its nature.
This second concern is due to what I understand to be something of a common perspective in Christian thought to regard even people that believe in something transcendent, but not exactly like the God of Abrahamic tradition, as atheists.
Deists, Pantheists, monists (like Hindus for one example) and in more ancient traditions, polytheists, were all considered atheistic by general Christian thought. Of course one could extend the idea of atheism beyond the Western concern, but it seems like atheism is not the concern so much of Eastern religious as impiety or improper praxis moreso. Feel free to chime in though if you have thoughts on Eastern faiths' regard for atheism and how to define it, etc.
And what about children? Are they considered atheists since they don't know the concept of God necessarily from birth, but are educated about it in church? Obviously it would be a bit quirky to ask if we could consider animals atheistic, since one argues commonly they don't have souls and thus cannot even consider the concept of God, let alone its existence.
Hope this helps with making my last inquiry into atheism more easily accessible on this forum. And I will not reply for a while to the posts unless you ask me to, just to be courteous
This second concern is due to what I understand to be something of a common perspective in Christian thought to regard even people that believe in something transcendent, but not exactly like the God of Abrahamic tradition, as atheists.
Deists, Pantheists, monists (like Hindus for one example) and in more ancient traditions, polytheists, were all considered atheistic by general Christian thought. Of course one could extend the idea of atheism beyond the Western concern, but it seems like atheism is not the concern so much of Eastern religious as impiety or improper praxis moreso. Feel free to chime in though if you have thoughts on Eastern faiths' regard for atheism and how to define it, etc.
And what about children? Are they considered atheists since they don't know the concept of God necessarily from birth, but are educated about it in church? Obviously it would be a bit quirky to ask if we could consider animals atheistic, since one argues commonly they don't have souls and thus cannot even consider the concept of God, let alone its existence.
Hope this helps with making my last inquiry into atheism more easily accessible on this forum. And I will not reply for a while to the posts unless you ask me to, just to be courteous
