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ragnelle 's List: About.com articles religion-atheism

  • Religion vs. Spirituality: Distinguishing Between Religion and Spirituality

    • Spirituality is a form of religion, but a private and personal form of religion. Thus, the valid distinction is between spirituality and organized religion.
    • Religion is spiritual and spirituality is religious. One tends to be more personal and private while the other tends to incorporate public rituals and organized doctrines.

  • What is Agnosticism? A Short Explanation of the Agnostic Position

    • agnosticism is about knowledge, and knowledge is a related but separate issue from belief, the domain of theism and atheism.
    • Those who disclaim any such knowledge or even that any such knowledge is possible are properly labeled agnostics
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  • Agnosticism and Commitment: Are Agnostics Just Sitting On the Fence?

    • A closely related agnostic position argues that we simply aren’t in any position to adequately evaluate the evidence offered both for and against the existence of God — assuming that any such evidence actually exists. This is closer to the stricter definition of agnosticism in that it focuses primarily upon human limitations as a reason for not being able to arrive at knowledge of the existence of God, but it adds the stipulation that these limitations should also prevent us from believing one way or the other.

  • Atheism vs. Agnosticism: What's the Difference? Are they Alternatives to Each Other?

    • atheism is merely the absence of belief in any gods, it becomes evident that agnosticism is not, as many assume, a “third way” between atheism and theism.
    • Agnosticism is not about belief in god but about knowledge — it was coined originally to describe the position of a person who could not claim to know for sure if any gods exist or not.
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  • Intelligent People Throughout History Have Believed in God, Why Don't Atheists? Do Atheists Think They're Better than the Smartest Theists?

    • It is true that smarter people than I and many other atheists have accepted theism and religion — but so what? Smarter people than you have rejected your brand of theism and your brand of religion in favor of some other type of theism and religion. Smarter people than you have rejected theism and religion entirely, leading an entirely atheistic and irreligious life. Do you think you're better or smarter than they were? Is this a reason for you to drop your theism and religion? Of course not.
    • while today there is a strong correlation between greater education and increased rates of atheism

  • Atheism & Hell: What if You Atheists Are Wrong? Aren’t You Afraid of Hell?

    • Pascal’s Wager: if the believer is wrong and God doesn’t exist, then nothing has been lost; on the other hand, if the atheist is wrong and God does exist, then the atheist risks going to hell. Therefore, it is smarter to take a chance on believing than to take a chance on not believing, and the atheist is in a bad spot.
    • Another problem is the assumption that there are only two options: either the believer is wrong or the atheist is wrong. In fact, both could be wrong because there could be a god, but not the god of the believer. Perhaps it is an entirely different god — indeed, it could be a god which objects to people who believe because of arguments like the above but which doesn’t really mind the doubt of atheists. Perhaps we are both in trouble and taking a risk. Perhaps neither of us in trouble or taking a risk.
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  • Myth: Atheism is a Crutch, Opiate of the Egotistical, Prepackaged Worldview - Does Atheism Allow Atheists to Avoid Thinking About Hard Questions?

    • People who promulgate this myth are trying to shift the burden of proof to atheists by making them justify their atheism. In reality, the burden of proof or support is on theists and unless they can show sufficient justification for their beliefs, then disbelief is the default. We are all born without belief in gods and most people live their lives without believing in most gods. If someone wants others to make an exception for one or two at some point, the burden is entirely theirs to show why.
    • reality is exactly the opposite of what myth portrays: atheism doesn't create any "prepackaged worldview," but precisely this is true of religions which tell people who they are, what their role is in the universe, how to behave, and how everything will turn out. Anyone who grows up in such an environment but leaves it behind must do exactly the opposite of what the myth claims about atheists: they will have to think for themselves, seek answers to difficult issues, and address life's most difficult questions — not so much because they are atheists, but because they can no longer simply accept the answers that had previously been provided by religion. Freethought isn't exclusively atheistic, but there's a reason why freethinkers are more likely to be atheists than theists.

  • Myth: Atheists Believe in a Random Universe, Not an Ordered & Orderly Universe - Does the Absence of a God Entail that the Universe be Disordered?

    • Atheists don't dispute that there are patterns in the universe, though, and even in truly random sets — like sequences of numbers — patterns will emerge. The existence of patterns does not contradict the existence of randomness.
    • religious theists seem to mean is that atheists' belief require a universe without order — that randomness entails disorder — and that therefore the existence of order in the universe means that some god (preferably their god) must exist
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  • Myth: Atheism Cannot Explain the Origin of the Universe, Nature of Existence - How can Atheists Account for the Existence of the Universe

    • The fact that people like to contrast atheism with Christianity on the basis of myths like this leads to another significant problem: Christianity doesn't "explain" the origin of the universe either. People misunderstand what an explanation is — it isn't to say "God did it," but rather to provide new, useful, and testable information. "God did it" isn't an explanation unless it includes information about what God did, how God did it, and preferably also why.
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