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Atheism
Atheism is the disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
1,002 Questions
For example: modern western society does not condemn or persecute homosexuals. But some Christians do. Most Christians do not believe this any more, but some on the right still do.
The same goes for women: modern western society accords women equal status and rights with men. Most Christians agree. The Mormons, however, do not. Neither do many evangelists.
AnswerIt should be noted that there are very good darwinistic reasons for morality. As mammals, we humans are very communal animals. We depend upon each other greatly, not just within a familial sense, but in a greater tribal sense as well. Examinations of the social interactions of other primates show us that it is not uncommon in nature for like animals to have an ingrained code of ethics when dealing with each other.
These codes of ethics are very rudimentary, and may not seem very moralistic to us humans, but it is easy to see how such behavioral norms are benificial to the speicies in an evolutionary way, and perhaps even a necessary part of any reasonably advanced social creature. After all, neanderthal man depended on his tribemates for survival. The neanderthal man who cheats, steals, and murders isn't as likely to pass on his genes as the neanderthal man who helps and loves his neighbors.
Thus we see how natural selection leads to morality.
AnswerYes they can. I am not an atheists myself but I do believe that they can be. A person who is atheist usually uses a myth approach which they teach in mythology in college. Being moral means to be good in nature and just because your religions views, or lack there of, is different doesn't mean that you can't be moral. AnswerIt all depends on the person. There are wonderful people of every background and belief and some terrible people from every one, too.
Was any signer of the declaration of independence an atheist?
The founders were a mixed group of Protestants that included the following denominations and included in that list were several who were also Deists.
- Episcopalian/Anglican
- Presbyterian
- Congregationalist
- Quaker
- Dutch Reformed/German Reformed
- Lutheran
- Catholic
- Huguenot
- Unitarian
- Methodist
There were no declared atheists who signed the Declaration of Independence. People who know about religious belief and rejected it as a part of their own life were treated with suspicion and contempt then much as they are today by religionists. However, a simple answer wouldn't explain the issue of atheism at that time. Several factors should be discussed to provide an informed answer to your question. Remember that this was the age of the Scientific Revolution and the Age of Enlightenment. Atheism was gaining a foothold in Europe among the intellectuals. Deism might be considered the first bridge leading from the traditional religious belief systems to atheism.
Deism holds that God does not interfere with the functioning of the natural world in any way. The world may have had a supernatural creator, who then stepped back, leaving nature to run things. He was not concerned with the daily life of people and did not communicate with them through books or revelation. Deists were more intellectually inclined individuals who were raised as Christians but viewed organized religion with disfavor. They didn't believe in supernatural events, the inerrancy of the bible or the Trinity.
Deists favored religious toleration, which would have supported an open expression of atheism. They tended to favor the civil freedom of conscience which was every person's right. Deists viewed the world with reason. An interesting aspect of reason is that free exercise of reason makes it possible to reason one's way into atheism. In fact, the United States Constitution did away with the harsh religious persecution practiced by the Puritans that was rampant in Colonial America. It bestowed all our citizens with the right to exercise the beliefs of their own choosing without fear of punishment. In no way did it launch the new nation as a Christian nation.
Why do atheists not believe in miracles?
A:
Christians do actually believe in miracles - just not the miracles of faiths other than their own. Catholics believe that miracles are constantly being performed, but other Christians believe the age of miracles is over.
What is the predominant religion of Russia?
I know Russia is the second country who believes in evolution so Atheism would be one of them
Christianity (mostly Russian Orthodox) with Islam and Buddhism in central Asia and far Eastern Russia.
Taylor hasn't made his religious beliefs public, but some sites claim he is a religious agnostic.
What does Richard Dawkins believe about the soul?
Dawkins self identifies himself as an atheist and states in the opening chapter of "The God Delusion":
"God is a delusion. ... Human thoughts and emotions emerge from exceedingly complex interconnections of physical entities within the brain. An atheist in this sense of philosophical naturalist is somebody who believes there is nothing beyond the natural, physical world, no supernatural creative intelligence lurking behind the observable universe, no soul that outlasts the body and no miracles - except in the sense of natural phenomena that we don't yet understand."
No.
There have been evil people who were atheist, just as there have been evil people who were theists.
And also plenty of good people of varying beliefs (and non-beiefs) as well.
For example: I am an atheist, and I'm not evil. None of my friends are evil, and most of them are atheist as well. Though some are religious, and I know a lovely Quaker lady.
Whoever told you that atheists are evil is, simply, lying to you. I wonder why they are trying to spread hatred of other human beings based only on their belief system?
Now, to me, that sounds pretty evil.
What is an example of atheism?
Atheism is the lack of any belief in deities or higher beings in a spiritual realm.
There's no real way to give an example of not believing in God or any gods as Atheists do not practice rituals or traditions to show disbelief.
Adding On:
An example of an atheist would be someone who generally doesn't believe in anything without evidence such as ghosts, hobbits, leprechauns, God, those kinds of things. But obviously as you can tell from the word aTHEIST, it is the opposite of theism, which is the belief in God, such as Catholics
How do atheists celebrate Christmas?
A collection of suggestions:
- Like everyone else - Santa is not religious.
- They celebrate Christmas with eating, drinking, getting together with friends. Much the same as they celebrate any ethnic or religious festival that involves eating, drinking and getting together with friends. Christmas is no more special than Wesak, the Eid, the summer solstice, Darwin Day. Pi Day or Hogmanay.
- i dont belive in him but hey free presents! :D
- Yes, atheists celebrate Christmas. We like to get presents just as much as Joe Christian. It is largely a secular holiday, what with all the commercialization of it.
- Atheists can celebrate Christmas. To them, it is more of a tradition, and atheists do value traditions. Most people do not need religion, a god, or jesus to value the gift of giving and to value spending time with family.
- There were festivals and celebrations at the time of the winter solstice long before there was a Christian church, for a couple of centuries at least before Jesus may have lived
- Like everyone who celebrates Christmas they do it without god or Jesus, Tjey are, however, aware of this fact.
What do we call a person one who does not believe in God?
Atheist
Atheist are the ones who are convinced that there is no God
Agnostics are the one who haven't decided yet or don't care at all whether there is a God
Anti-theist actively oppose the belief in God
Theists believe that there is a God (or gods) who created the universe
-Monotheists believe such as Muslims believe that their is only one God
-Polytheists believe that there are many Gods
What are the 5 characteristics to make a religion?
Honesty, peace, love, honour, preservation of life, understanding, respect, and acceptance of those who are different.
Unless the religion involves killing, of course.
Killing of animals and humans warrants an intervention, into the practices of the culture, the sacrafice of animals to a higher power that the animals carcase might provide food, clothing, shelter, tools. The sacraficing of a human on the other hand, requires more investigation, sacrafice for a crime is acceptable, sacrafice for what, who, how they are is murder.
How many atheists are in America?
Disbelievers, around 3-12 million, non-believers well over 40 million.
_____
Some polls put religious belief in the USA as high as 90%. That's much higher than in any European country. Trying to determine the number of atheists in any country is difficult: but in a country which has so many religious fundamentalists, it would be impossible to gather any accurate figures.
______
A new Gallop polls showed that upward of about 15% of the American population, roughly twenty million Americans, are atheists.
How do atheist spread their faith?
Atheists are not a society with motives , programs to spread "the faith', convert others, secret handshakes or passwords. Atheists do not spread their faith, each one who is an atheist has come to that position by personal inspection of the foibles and falsehoods of religions and the belief in the existence of a god or gods.
What guidance there is comes from logic, insight, research, evidence and the ability to say "That does not make sense when presented with religious and dogmatic positions.
As strangeas it may sound to the religious, the more a person educates himself, the more apt he is to become an atheist.
It is somewhat of a satisfaction to know that, as an individual, you know not to kill, lie, cheat, steal, abuse children or animals, or lay waste to others homes. All that knowledge without a god or clergy telling you.
Solipism is a phylosophical idea proposing that one's own mind is all that exists, with the rest of the universe, including people, etc, being just projections of your own mind. For example, if you are a solipist, then this answer in wikiAnswers you are just reading right now comes from your own mind, so you either just invented solipism as a concept or you already knew what it was but had not realised it yet.
Carlos
It's as old as man himself. The first time a man looked into the sky, he strained to explain what he saw. Over time, this evolved into religion. Now we know why most of these things happen, but unfortunately, religion has endured.
We will never know for sure how the first religions began, but it is likely that it is along the lines described in the question. One pattern which is very noticable (and still is, among religions today) is that as knowledge grows, religions retreat.Christianity, for example, used to tell people what the stars were, and that the sun went around the earth. As knowledge grows, religions shrink and try to explain less and less. A Christian from 1000 years ago would not recognise modern Christianity. No posession by demons - that's mental illness (though the Vatican, scandalously, still practise exorcism today). No relics of saints being traded. No splinters from the True Cross being sold.
Modern versions of religions are basically hollow shells of what they were before.
Doctor Fred Hollows was an Australian eye specialist who could have become a wealthy man simply by practising in his own country. Instead, he travelled around some of the poorest countries in the world, providing his services free of charge, raising awareness of sight problems in poor nations and encouraging other to follow his example. Regarding his beliefs, Dr. Hollws said, "I am a humanist, I don't believe in any higher power than the best expressions of the human spirit, and those are to be found in personal and social relationships."
One person who certainly is an atheist is Bill Gates. Unlike Dr Hollows, Bill Gates is a very rich man, but he is giving away most of his wealth to help provide cures for diseases that affect the very poor in this world.
One of the most generous, prolific and renown philanthropists was Andrew Carnegie. He was also an atheist. His good works are all around us. He knew that the best way to help the poor was through education and he set about providing places of learning where the poor could have access to educational materials.
Carnegie's philosophy was extremely focused- he thought it was the duty of rich men to use their fortunes for the welfare of their community. To that end he disposed of his great fortune by endowing educational, cultural, scientific, and technological institutions. Carnegie funded thousands of free public libraries.
How do you prevent atheism from spreading?
One has to wonder why you would want to!
However, religious belief does gradually seem to be declining in the world, so it seems difficult to try and stop atheism growing.
Answer 2:
Atheism spreads when people know they can believe whatever they want to believe and also choose not to believe or be a part of. And atheism spreads even faster when there isn't much forcing people to believe in a certain way. Look at Islam and Judaism. They have very aggressive rules about how one should believe. Not conforming to those criteria could mean expulsion, community detachment and even death. You won't find many atheists there. But then look at christian communities, where there is a lot of freedom in what and how to believe. Someone who acknowledges to be gay or athiest doesn't really face harse consequences. You find many atheists here.
Atheisms is also directly related to our dependency on technology. The more advanced our understanding on nature becomes, the more we rely more on technology and science than on God. As you can see people is still debating the big bang theory.
So how do you prevent it !? The solution is to teach your children to be god fearing.
What is the evidence of the atheist for existence of the future either for self or for the universe?
Well if I understand your question correctly, I don't think the average atheist has any solid evidence of when the world will end, nor do Christians or any other religion.
There seems to be a widespread misconception that atheists have a system of belief similar to religious systems. They do not. There is no atheistic body of evidence to explain things. There is no atheist point of view about when and how the universe will end. Generally they pay heed to scientific studies and theories.
Answer:
If by atheist you mean "secular" or "nonreligious" there are many scientific proofs available for the existence of earth and human life over a period in the past coming to the present. For life this includes fossils, radiation. location in strata and so on. For the time for the Universe's existence until now the cosmic background microwave radiation, viewable distances, the ages of stars and other methods provide some data. However the future is not viewable to science or religion with any certainty. Science can postulate scenarios that give potential estimates if things proceedin a certain manner, but changing the setting of the scenario constraints changes the estimates.
What is Richard Dawkins' view on war?
You'd have to ask him directly for an accurate answer.
From his writings, I would infer that he would regard wars in different ways according to the circumstances.
The Second World War he would probably feel was justified: the Allies took forceful action to eliminate an evil regime.
The Crusades, by contrast, were basically caused entirely by differing faith positions. They achieved nothing positive, and were an appalling waste of human life, and a source of tremendous suffering - for no real reason.
That's what I imagine he'd feel. But like I said: you'll have to ask him.
War is sometimes necessary to prevent greater evil. Sometimes it's evil itself.
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The final quote is awesome
What comes closest to atheism in religious thinking?
Atheism is the non-belief in a deity of any sort. This precludes any religion that has a supernatural source of authority such as Christianity, Judaism, Islam, pantheism, Hinduism, even Satanism and Wicca (even though these are often touted by theists as being equivalent to atheism).
This leaves us with the philosophical "religions" such as Buddhism and Taoism and philosophies of life like humanism and even North Korea's Juche. The Stoicism discussed in writings such as the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius with its ideal of dispassionate compliance with natural forces also has many close parallels with Buddhist thought.
A religious system regarded as misguided or unorthodox?
That depends who you ask. In many cases, that would be any religion other than the one the person you ask believes in. For example, some Catholics may consider Protestantism as misguided, and vice-versa.
ANSWER 2:
Religious systems regarded as misguided or unorthodox are usually called "cults."
