Atheism Essay

In a region where Christianity and Catholicism is the dominant religion, people that do not affiliate themselves with religion, such as atheists or agnostics, are often frowned upon by the followers of God. Many people don’t realize that the discrimination of these people in America is very real and is a serious issue. All over the states, thousands of people are being looked down on by their acquaintances solely due to their lack of religious beliefs. This shouldn’t have to be an issue in the “land of the free”. People need to be more aware of the growing concern about the treatment of non-religious people in America.

- The classical version of atheism is vastly different than the atheism that is known today.

Being an atheist can be difficult. It was my choice to become an atheist but I don’t have any desire to sway others to become atheists, it’s their choice. One of the things that are difficult for me is when the topic of religion is discussed. I understand people are entitled to their own opinions and I don’t think someone who believes in a god is wrong. However, I dislike when stereotype atheist as sinful and wicked people. It’s difficult to defend to others without seeming rude or hostile. Another thing that is difficult for me is when people try to preach their religion to me. I understand some religions teach that their religion is the only truth, and they want everyone around them to embrace it. However, it’s difficult to tell a person you don’t believe in their god without them getting offended and receiving negative comments.

As someone who is himself in a short period of life considered an atheist, I wanted to briefly look back on this phenomenon. Atheism is a term that has many different definitions, and these definitions are often correspond to a similar worldview. This article is to generally encompass the following systems of beliefs (atheists apologize in advance if their specific form of atheism these definitions is not included):

The faith in Divine beings has always existed all throughout human written history, despite the fact that it has different cultural definitions. Regardless of whether it be the Greek Divine beings: Apollo, and Zeus, or the Judeo-Christian God, accepted by Christians in the advanced society. Assuming that God does not exist, what clarifies the social advancement of their false belief? The debate on God's presence has raised a significant number of philosophical issues. Does God exist?

This movement is generally called New Atheism, and Erika Blair has identified five main “pillars” of the movement, two of which I will focus on here: “(1) faith and belief in human evolution and the finality of the genius of Charles Darwin …. (4) self-realization through knowledge/humanism/morality” (Blair 9). Stephen LeDrew studies “active atheists,” such as those who join groups like CFI, and he asserts that a scientific worldview (“Reply” 466) and morality (“Discovering Atheism” 447) are key aspects of New Atheist belief. I found these pillars and aspects evident at the CFI meeting. In our conversations, my friend Lance has also made comments that reflect some of these

While sitting down and talking to Sam she told me that she is an atheist. I was a bit confused by this for a moment since for years she has always maintained that she follows Wiccanism. Actually, my first thought was “Now I have to change the concept of my paper.” How can someone be an atheist but still have a religious belief system? Sam explained

As people, we are reliant on religion for the reason that it lines up morality in a set of instructions. Religion defines what we fight for, what we eat, and why we exist. For millions of years religions have provided us a reason to live. For these reasons it starts to make sense why people are becoming afraid of atheism. It threatens millions ways of life, and people use atheism as a scapegoat for why religion worldwide is becoming unpopular. As more and more people question faith and render it to not be logical people begin to fear. But using atheism as a scapegoat is falsely claiming it as the reason for people denying religion when it actually is the result. Religion's enemy is not atheism it is the followers of religion.

In the Western Hemisphere atheism can trace its roots into the 5th century BC in Ancient Greece. The title of the “First Atheist” can arguably be given to Diagoras of Melos. He and many other men who claimed to be atheists believed that the gods existed but they did not concern themselves with human affairs. This could be better described as Deism. Also the proposition of agnosticism took a position claiming that an existence of a supernatural divine is unknown and will remain unknowable. During these times atheism was a

I have seen and experienced how this atheists can be seen with a very negative connotation. For some of us realizing we are atheists can be as simple as a sudden realization. "One week ago I worshiped the Bible. One week ago I wasted Sundays mornings at church. One week ago I was convinced in a fairy tale"(Cimino) However for most of us it is a gradual realization that we need to eventually tell others about on our own time. Unfortunately this experience comes from within my own family, who are the definition of an extremely religious family, aside from my father. "Certainly someone who grew up with a secular or at least religiously unenthusiastic parent will be more likely to lose faith than someone whose parents were both earnestly

The three scholarly articles I read on atheism had numerous differences and similarities. Each article focused on a different idea or problem involving atheism, but there were numerous similarities regarding the authors’ opinions on atheism. The main difference in all three academic sources was the main focus of each academic source. The first article focused on whether or not atheism should be considered a religion and the evolution of the definition of religion (Davis 707-723). The second article focused on the importance of the politics of atheism in our understanding of what it means to be an atheist (LeDrew 464-469). Finally, the third article focuses on disproving Paul Ricoeur’s interpretation on atheism (Amini 7-13). Although all three articles are different, they present similar and different ideas on how we, as a society, view atheism and what it means to be an atheist.

During watching this particular clip from the youtube video for which I selected, I wanted to really give the video discussion my fair opinion; so, I watched it a few times in order to me to feel as such. I believe this belief system of Atheism, is a lot concerned with people who don’t really go off of any kind of religion or faith. This outlook on life or the world and I call it that instead of religion because Atheist does not believe in a faith or religion, so it is not. I think that’s fair to say, right? Atheist or and the individuals in this video don’t seem to be looking to open there minds up to really accept what could possibly

atheists- throughout the history of thought. Although in recent years many well know what the

As our society evolves, we continue to perceive norms and morals individually, although, society likes to dictate that we should all be the same. According to our culture, an individual who doesn’t believe in the existence of God is an atheist; that is our everyday assumption of someone who is atheist, is just agnostic. Even by just typing into Google, “What is Atheism?” in a matter of 0.34 seconds, it answers that it is a disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods. But according to an atheist society website, American Atheist, they state that “Atheism is not a belief system nor is it a religion”, thus leaving people in a state of confusion on what actually is Atheism.

The first type of Agnosticism is Strong Agnosticism. Strong Agnostics not only don’t believe in a god, but they would go as far to say that no one can or does know if any god exist. They argue that there is no clear evidence that a god exist. Strong agnosticism is hard to defend, because their definition of god and someone else's may be different as it would be with any religion. Overall Strong Agnostics will need a lot of evidence