Talk:Atheism
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Changes: God to metaphysics:In the human culture, there is more than one god and there is also others possible explanations besides gods, like UFOs. Metaphysics is the best word to be used here since it don´t take sides to any religion.
"atheistic view of the world" to "atheistic/agnostic view of the world": Science and Evolution are agnostic. They don´t need nor use god to explain themselves, but also don´t disprove any god.
"Nothing in science requires a God. Of course, not much else requires a God either, and no (sane) person associates it with atheism. I've never heard of anyone complaining that car manufacturers are atheistic because cars do not require a belief in God to be built. Or that surgeons are atheistic because they do not require a belief in God in order to perform surgery. So why complain that biologists are atheistic because their job does not require a belief in God?"
I think a Wiki has a goal to be impartial, trying to assign Atheism to Evolution and science is just wrong, ans this article is too partial, it just make sounds Atheism as a bad thing.
- Cristiano
This is not an impartial wiki. It is dedicated to creation science and the creationist worldview. Only creationists are permitted to edit the CreationWiki. Limit your future changes to the discussion pages. These changes to the atheism page were previously noted and reversed. Do not undo the actions of the administrators or your IP will be banned.
--Chris Ashcraft 23:23, 2 Jun 2005 (GMT)
Does the creationist worldview include bashing atheists? --JasonSC 23:45, 17 Oct 2005 (GMT)
- No, but the atheist worldview includes bashing creationists. Go to EvoWiki and Wikipedia and you'll find all that stuff and more. Scorpionman 13:37, 7 June 2006 (CDT)
Ah, I see, EvoWiki had said that about you... Sorry for trying to elucidate one thing that you surely don´t know nothing about... Well, be happy with your partial fairy tale... cya, Cristiano
Do you really think the EvoWiki is impartial? If I were to post material that favored the creation or intelligent design point of view, do you think it would remain? --Chris Ashcraft 01:38, 16 Jun 2005 (GMT)
"Evolution may be better called evolutionism as it is considered a religion by many." I'm not aware of anyone who thinks that evolution has anything to say about religion or God. People may believe that it removes God from the process of speciation, but it clearly doesn't disproove God's existance. It is possible to believe that God caused evolution to start, and many people do believe that. Discussion of a natural process such as this one does not disproove God or tell you how to live any more than does discussion of gravity, propagation of disease or the Coreolis effect. I think that statement is misleading because God is nowhere mentioned in the theory of evolution and nobody has tried to make it that way. --Komencanto 07:53, 15 Jun 2005 (GMT)
There are many religions that do not worship a diety, such as Buddhism. A religion is simply a belief system that overwhelms ones thoughts and actions. Other definitions describe it as a cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion. Evolutionists clearly qualify as religious followers. To believe in evolution probably requires more faith in things unseen than the religions that worship God. --Chris Ashcraft 01:38, 16 Jun 2005 (GMT)
Hmm...so any "activity pursued with zeal" qualifies as a religion? So watching/playing sports, studying for an important exam, or running for mayor are all religions now? Interesting... --JasonSC 23:50, 17 Oct 2005 (GMT)
Yes, they can be. In fact, we have an expression: "He\she (watches football\follows politics,etc) religiously." Of course, evolutionists don't like people thinking you can have religion without a deity. That might lead people to think evolution is a religion, what with the constant denial of any other view, campaigning against them, preaching evolution as the ONLY possible explanation of origins. PrometheusX303 20:14, 5 January 2006 (GMT)
Reading CreationWiki's own definitions of religion, I am not sure in what way evolution classifies as a religion. The article on 'Religion' states three different definitions of religion: evolution does for sure not fall under definition 2 (formal) and 3 (organizational). Also, evolution does not address any of the fundamental questions listed under definition 1 (the functional definition). One may be an evolutionist and use some aspect of evolutionary theory to incorporate in one's ethical position or one's view on human identity. This is, however, up to everyone individually and evolutionary theory itself does not claim how such should be done. Unless someone can convince me of the opposite, I suggest that the passage on evolution in this article is changed. nooijer
I hope I can keep this short.
You said: "I'm not aware of anyone who thinks that evolution has anything to say about religion or God. People may believe that it removes God from the process of speciation, but it clearly doesn't disproove God's existance."
This website is made from and for people who believe evolution has something to say about religion and God. There are people such as Popper who saw the metaphysical aspect of evolution. Also to follow logically from the evolutionary viewpoint shows that religion would only be part of man's development to a better understanding of the world. Taking some sections of social evolution to the extreme, even belief in a deity and the books people believe in are simply constructs of man to help them understand a mysterious world and universe, and to keep people suppressed, manageable, making a community with is able to survival, survival being one of the main evolutionary urges in living beings.
So because evolution touches on where we come from as human beings, it does also touch upon religion and our concepts of "god".
You also said: "It is possible to believe that God caused evolution to start, and many people do believe that."
It is possible for anyone to believe almost anything. But it has been argued that the God that caused evolution, which, according to evolutionists is an unguided process, is not the God spoken of in the Bible. It is a god of someone's own thoughts who has to bow down to whatever naturalistic scientists say. If those scientists say that evolution is true, then in a person's mind God must have done things that way. But if Deity says in quite a plain way that he created everything in six days (with the context and definitions pointing to normal days), but mainstream scientists says something different, it is the mainstream scientists that will have the stronger voice, and people will try to fit their god round what the evolutionary scientists have said. Thus the god, the main controller, isn't the god in the person's mind, but the scientists who have the final word in what God actually did, even though they were there to see, they don't have all the evidence, there is evidence against what they say, and can and do often get things wrong.
You said: "Discussion of a natural process such as this one does not disproove God or tell you how to live any more than does discussion of gravity, propagation of disease or the Coreolis effect. I think that statement is misleading because God is nowhere mentioned in the theory of evolution and nobody has tried to make it that way."
Discussion of natural processes do not disprove God, I agree. But when everything even in the unobserved, unobservable past has to be described naturally, by natural means, and then it is taught and shown as the only thing that can be deduced scientifically then the question has to come up: why? The answer isn't because true science, operational science based on observation and experimentation and repeatability, says so, but because of an philosophical agenda towards naturalism. Operational science helps us observe and define what is known as the coriolis effect, the propogation of disease, and what gravity does. Each of these has been observed and tested. Each of these required human presence to document such things. The distant past is outside of such observation and testing and rests more on philosophical assumptions and belief systems rather than what we experience.
The problem is not that God is nowhere mentioned in evolution. Few creationists would complain that God is nowhere mentioned in laws governing electricity and electron flow, based on the belief that Deity put such laws into motion at creation. The problem is that it speaks of a history beyond science proper based on philosophy, rather than evidence, that only natural explanations are valid for anything universally despite the problems with the theory, despite the inadequacy of natural forces on their own, thus logically leaving Deity locked in oblivion. The circumstantial evidence it has either is full of holes, like the fossil record, or the use of miniscule changes in moths or plants to promote a theory of mega-change or trans-genera/family change and increase in genetic complexity; or that evidence has other possible explanations including intelligent design, like the intercomplexity of living creatures.
USA atheism statistics need to be clarified in article
It is likely true that "....according to the American Religious Identification Survey taken in 2001, the number of adults in the U.S. identifying with "no religion" has doubled since 1990; from 14.3 million (8%) in 1990 to the current 29.4 million (14.1%).
However, the amount of people becoming atheist/agnostics in the USA has likely not changed according to social researchers. [1][2]
Creationist 21:15, 15 December 2005 (GMT)creationist
Theistic evolution
While most evolutionists are indeed atheists, there are many who also believe in God. This information needs to be included in the article, under a title "Theistic Evolutionists". Now of course that whole idea is just as stupid as evolutionism since the Bible has no indications that God used evolution to create, in fact the Bible says he created the world in six days which counters the belief that God created over "billions of years". Scorpionman 13:35, 7 June 2006 (CDT)
- Go for it! My only thought is, since this article is about atheism, theistic evolution should only be discussed insofar as it is relevant to understanding atheism ... Ungtss 14:47, 7 June 2006 (CDT)
- I dont see "theistic evolutionists" having any relevance to atheism.
--Chris Ashcraft 22:13, 27 June 2006 (CDT)
- Neither do I. Atheism and theism have to do with believing in a god. Whether a theist believes in evolutionism or creationism is irrelevant to the topic of this particular article. PrometheusX303 22:28, 27 June 2006 (CDT)
Re: "An atheist is a person who is either without beliefs in God, or one who actively believes there is no God."
Er... No. An atheist is a person who is either without beliefs in any gods, or one who actively believes there are no gods. You are including your own special treatment of your particular god into the views of those who make no such distinguishment. This is a misrepresentation. Roy 15:20, 2 July 2006 (CDT)
- Roy, I believe you are mistaken. Roy, please use a Philosophy Enyclopedia to defend your view. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy atheism "means the negation of theism, the denial of the existence of God." [3] Similarly, according to the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, probably the preeminent reference tool for philosophy, "Atheism is the position that affirms the nonexistence of God. It proposes positive belief rather than mere suspension of disbelief." [4] Atheism is derived from the Greek word "atheos" - "a" meaning no or without and "theos" meaning God.[5] Creationist 09:42, 9 December 2006 (EST)creationist
- I am not mistaken. Here is one such definition, from [6]:
- Atheism: (Gr. a, no; theos, god) Two uses of the term:
- 1. The belief that there is no God.
- 2. Some philosophers have been called "atheistic" because they have not held to a belief in a personal God. Atheism in this sense means "not theistic."
- I think that is what the author meant, but you are correct that, as written, it is specific when it shouldn't be. I changed it to reflect that. I also decapitalised God because theos originally refered to many Greek gods. PrometheusX303 21:47, 2 July 2006 (CDT)
- Well, I tried.
Mr. Ashcraft, may I trouble you for an explanation as to why you reverted the changes?PrometheusX303 10:30, 3 July 2006 (CDT)
- Well, I tried.
When “God” is the name of a god, as in Judaism, Christianity and Islam (“Allah” is just Arabic for “God,” and many modern Muslims translate the name when writing in English), it needs to be capitalized like any other name. When it is used as a generic term, as in “He looks like a Greek god,” it is not capitalized. [7]PrometheusX303 18:19, 7 July 2006 (CDT)
I improved the beggining of the article to reflect the most common definition of atheism among philosophers and to clarify a controversy
Here is what I wrote:
According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy atheism "means the negation of theism, the denial of the existence of God." [8] Similarly, according to the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, probably the preeminent reference tool for philosophy, "Atheism is the position that affirms the nonexistence of God. It proposes positive belief rather than mere suspension of disbelief." [9] In addition, recently there have been a number of attempts by atheists to redefine the meaning of atheism in order to shift the burden of proof in relation to the question of the existence of God. [10] Atheism is derived from the Greek word "atheos" - "a" meaning no or without and "theos" meaning God.[11]
- By doing this you have deliberately omitted the second valid (though less common) meaning. Your comment about shifting the burden of proof is a transparent attempt to avoid supporting your own claims. I also note that the sources you cite make the same error pointed out previously, and assume that atheists disbelieve your specific God, not just any and all gods. Roy 16:07, 31 December 2006 (EST)
No, that's not what he did. It says that atheism is a lack of belief in any god. What are you doing here anyhow? Scorpionman 23:21, 30 January 2007 (EST)
- It says no such thing. Roy 09:01, 21 April 2007 (EDT)
