Atheism

They might think that your life is dedicated to atheism and that there's no way to tell you otherwise.

ditto

You can plead nicely, you can call them names, you can put them on ignore - Nothing rids the thread of deists and agnostics.

Agreed.

A life cannot be dedicated to atheism, since there is no overriding philosophy to adhere to.

Actually, there is a philosophy; "I do not believe in any gods, omnipotent thing, or creator." I'm in opposition of all religions, because I believe they are all created by man (no woman need apply). That's one of the clues; it's man based putting women in secondary roles. That's a bunch of malarkey - in my world. Buddhist gods, Hindu gods, christian gods, Muslim gods, sun gods, mythological gods, and all the other gods created by men or women are just that - mental masterbation. It may feel good, but that's the extent of their beliefs.

However, I also believe that those who believe in their gods are sincere and true to themselves. Isn't that all that matters in life?

Dream on mate, it ain't neva gonna happen because I'm never wrong, live with it..
You remind me of Delbert Grady flatly denying the truth when it's presented to him-
JACK - "Mr. Grady, you were the caretaker here. I recognize you, I saw your picture in the newspapers. You chopped your wife and daughters up into little bits and then you blew your brains out."
GRADY - "That's strange, sir. I don't have any recollection of that at all."

You and your damn threats.

Nor should it!

Deists, theists, and agnostics have as much right to participate in this thread as atheists.

Yeah...you are never wrong!

That's your philosophy CI. Wilso's point stands. Atheists are not united by what we don't believe in and have no evidence for. Anymore than people who don't believe in Santa Claus are united.

You wrote a contradiction,

If it's not philosophy, why did/does the great minds talk about atheism? Why does atheism exist? Why do they attempt to describe, analyze, and make statements about atheism? Why do some atheistic people believe in a god only when they are in their death bed? Why is it that the idea of atheism has more than one aspect to it as it does religious belief? Why do some people use logic and science to determine whether they are religious or an atheist?

It's because it's a philosophy.

We are all born atheists CI.. Atheism is written about because it is seen as an (often threatening) anomaly in a non-secular world. God belief is a socio-cultural construct, perhaps an inevitable one.

The mere fact that we disagree proves the point that we are not united in a single philosophy. I don't doubt your atheism or mine. I reiterate a quote I posted recently:

Calling atheism a belief system is like calling 'not going skiing' a hobby.

I became an atheist long before I had a thought for philosophy or belief systems. Never thought I had to justify myself before theists began to pester me.

God save us atheists and agnostics.

You like being pestered by theists ed.

Maybe it's your altruism. You encourage theists to pester you to give them less time to pester others.

More like it is you seeking argument on a subject you are certain about. Possibly due to the attentions of Mr Knox's "monstrous regiment" having caused you to be uncertain about everything else.

Take your pine trees for example.

When it comes to pestering theists are well down the ratings.

Try a deckchair in the sun beside a filtration unit at a sewage plant.

Personally, I call the topic of atheism an anti-philosophy. There are legions of theists and their philosophy/ies has often historically been fashioned into various religions. Churches and such have used/misused this choke-hold of the masses and whipped up these fervent loyalist passions to make war in its name (when in reality it was for power and profit) but I digress.

So while in the act of being a non-religionist and/or an atheist, they're engaging in the non-practicing of a religion and resisting dogma and/or categorization of a label as a philosophy.

Some people are atheists simply because they don't need any "spiritual" belief in their lives.
Others don't see any evidence for any gods. Some see too many conflicts between all the religions of the world. Some use logic, and some use science.

Why are you an atheist? My reasons could be different in many ways than others. That's because the question of atheism isn't based on one reason.

We all decide in what to believe or not believe based on our own subjective reasons.

I became 'anti-religious" when i was about five years old. I didn't doubt the god proposition, but i was unfavorably impressed by his staff. When i was about six, we had a long dry spell when the ground began to crack. I was worried that one might fall through into hell, I was angry that a small child should have to worry about such things.

When i came to adolescence, i was in almost constant battle about participation in religious activities. I finally cut a deal to the effect tht i would participate in the confirmation rigamarole without making any trouble, but that thereafter, i would have nothing to do with any churches. Both sides honored the agreement.

I high school i learned about agnosticism, and decided that that described me, because i really didn't know. However, as the years rolled by, and while in university, i realized that i found the god proposition preposterous. I'm still "agnostic" in that i don't know, but i don't believe it, and that definitely makes me an atheist. This wasn't casual, either, I learned a great deal about religion and the history of religion, at a time when the history departments of universities were engaged in a good deal of strife, largely because of the recent publication of The Passover Plot. This was a scholarly work, and one which infuriated christians, but i won't go into that here. At the same time, i became aware that there really is no historical evidence for the so-called Jesus, and that therefore the Schonfield book was based on an undemosnrated premise. It was not influential for me in the way it was with many people--its influence on me was to examine what i believed, and didn't believe, in a more detailed and careful manner. The conclusion i came to, which really hasn't changed in more than 40 years, is that the proposition is absurd, and that even the idea of god as prime mover entails an unnecessary supernatural element introduced into cosmogony.

So i don't believe.