lol... what an ignorant post..

I don't think it's a religion because it doesnt really advocate anything (other than often including "try not to believe things without evidence" which doesnt read like a religious doctrine to me and is not even universally held).

In my experience, people who wish to call 'new atheism' a religion (or anti-theism or whatever) are usually focussing on the manner in which one responds to or acts upon one's beliefs, rather than the beliefs themselves. Consequently, I think it's a mistake to label the beliefs a religion - what you're identifying is the actions of the 'militant atheist' not some set of beliefs they hold.

I don't think it's wrong to suggest some atheists pursue their particular brand of atheism with something of a religious fervour - but it's poetic language used to convey the manner in which they discuss atheism/theism and atheists/theists, not a factual description intending to characterise the beliefs they hold (which are usually unspecified).

The point of this argument is (and always has been) to counter the obvious problem that all thinking religious people have to struggle with: Religious people are forced to claim that 99.9% of organized religions invented since the dawn of time are absolute BS...but theirs is correct.

Once you've conceded that at least 99.9% of religions are false, it's not much of a stretch to concede that maybe all religions are false. The only way to avoid taking this next logical step (and saving one's personal faith) is by playing word games and claiming that even atheism is a religion.

"Atheism is a religion" is the last refuge of a thinking theist who is struggling with the notion that his religion probably looks as goofy to others as the thousands of other religions look to him. He's conceding that most religions (possibly even his own) are flawed, but since atheism is a religion, too, it's just as illogical and faith based as any other.

False. I in no way have to say that all religions are "complete BS". I say quite the opposite.

And rejecting something as the most accurate reflection of reality is a far cry from claiming it is a complete contradiction of reality.

You're right. I probably should have reworded those first two paragraphs. Also, I admire your openness to the idea that different religions might possess different amounts of truth to them.

I guess you could start making claims like "Muslims have more accurate picture of reality than Buddhists" or that "The Jewish Faith is a more accurate reflection of reality than the religion of the ancient Greeks," but at the end of the day, you are still claiming that you (personally) hit the jackpot and that your belief system is more accurate picture of reality than any other organized religion, right?

God's message and personal relationship with you is real, but God's personal message and personal relationship to the hijackers on 9/11 was a delusion, right?

I still think you have to conceded that 99.9% religions are at least somewhat flawed, right?

Atheists, whether militant or not, will be not be spared by the Great Old Ones when they return. However, for the sake of survival perhaps it is wise that modern man flees into the comforting ignorance of atheism, because if the full horror of our cosmic predicament were widely known, we would surely go mad from the knowledge and extinction would soon follow...

I'm pretty sure he meant something more akin to this,

yeah, they are on their way...

In my view, it makes more sense to concede that 100% of religions are at least somewhat flawed. It seems to me that most of the objectionable things about religion stem from overestimating how likely it is that one's religious beliefs are true or equivalently by overestimating religion's ability to lead one to the truth.

I think religion has value, but you don't have to declare certainty in order to derive that value - nor is someone's religion better than mine just because they are certain they are correct while I am certain I am (at least partly) wrong.

I disagree. To me, making the claim that "atheism is religion" shows a lack of thinking. It seems like such an absurd claim that runs counter to the intended definition of "religion" that I refuse to believe much thinking goes into it.

I think that it is intellectually dishonest to say that religion is solelly a belief in a deity. Religion at it's core has very little to do with belief in a deity.

If you took out belief in god from the Christian worldview but kept everything else the same, would you really no longer consider it a religion?

Depending on exactly what you mean, I would most likely not consider it a religion. To me, this is not intellectual dishonesty, but simply adhering to the spirit of the definition.

Moral codes and worldviews are already words. And if you want to keep the rituals around too -- many once-religious rituals are observed by people without regards to their original religious meanings (eg Halloween). So I don't see what the word 'religion' has to do with these things anymore.

Certainly it's not the fundamental quality of a religion, and not even a necessary component. Buddhism, for instance, takes very little stance on the existence of deities. Some Buddhists are monotheists, others polytheists, and still others atheists, because belief in a deity is not essential to Buddhism. However, I would argue that every religion must involve some belief in a supernatural phenomenon (i.e. a deity, an afterlife, reincarnation, mythical beings, magic, karma, immaterial spirits) of some kind, which separates religion from mere philosophy.

Point taken, though I think Christianity is a poor example because belief in a singular deity of a particular kind is such an essential belief that the rest of the religion would be largely nonsensical without it. None of the rituals make sense without said deity. An attempt to live by a certain set of ethical principles as embodied by Christ would count as a philosophy (indeed, this route has been attempted, perhaps most famously by Thomas Jefferson). If you throw in the resurrection, that crosses into religion. I suppose you could discount the God factor outside of that and simply make Christ an extraordinary human, but the story loses some of its caché without that... oh, I see what they did there.

Haha that's what I thought too. how can that even be possibly true. Logic fail.

A quick 'ready reckoner' breakdown for OP and his ilk (cut out and collect!):



It's interesting to note that going by the reckoner, something like, say, Marxism would probably count as a religion (specifically an apocalyptic movement), while stamp-collecting, the absence of stamp-collecting and, naturally, atheism would not. The list isn't exhaustive, and no one item is necessary (I don't think Jainism has a founding figure), and Buddhism is going to be awkward, but isn't it always?

And yeah, I've often wondered why a certain section of the theist community seems to think it would be some kind of 'victory' to have atheism classed as a religion. Implicitly, the line makes membership of the category 'religion' a negative, a reason to dismiss. I suppose it's ultimately just another mirror chess tactic, and doomed to the same failure as all of those.

That said, there probably are people for whom 'devotion' to atheism fulfils needs other people fulfil through religion. But then ditto genealogy, astronomy and a host of other things which, interestingly enough, no-one ever tries to claim are religions - which is exactly how you know that theists pushing the 'atheism = religion' idea have impure (and probably inconsistent) motives for so doing.

The "new atheism" seems to have at least 3 of the 4 listed there AIF. So will you agree now that it should be considered a religion?

Presumably it refutes those who make broad attacks against 'religion in general'. Also, if you can persuade people that atheism is just one choice amongst many equals, it's easier to shift the burden of proof to the atheist - "where's the evidence for your religion then?"

What is the new atheism exactly? Has that ever been spelt out anywhere?

Explain. Immediately. And so help me if you called "Darwinism" a "Creation Myth."

Mahavira, just for the record.

Hinduism is a far more difficult matter since it could easily be viewed as an entire range of sub-religions, and grew very gradually out of a fusion of Vedic and Dravidian folk practices and myths.

I'll spot you a founding figure or group of figures - Harris, Dawkins, Dennett and Hitchens (can we make a HDDH tetragram? I think we can!). Creation myth... nah, I mean firstly it's not a myth as I understand the term, and secondly it doesn't concern creation - not even Big Bang-type cosmology concerns 'creation'. Basically, if 'New Atheism' was a religion, the creation myth entry could consist of nothing but 'Refer to the current scientific consensus' - so I don't think we can count it.

There's no prescriptive morality to the 'New Atheism' - they don't like religion, but apart from saying that they don't have a lot to say about regular morality, except to insist that they too adhere to some form of it.

As for eschatology - well, if we were to say that NA was an apocalyptic movement a la Marxism, I suppose religion itself would be 'Babylon'. But overall there's too little coherence to 'New Atheism' (being that it's largely a fictional invention of journalists and demagogues) to give you that one.

So it's one out of four as far as I can count. How do you see it?

I suppose. Still seems weird though - especially considering how many actual religions are also quite down on all the other faiths.

There are many different definitions of religion. I was saying that New Atheism would match up with every definition one wanted to use.


However, I think it is important to not simply see what the metaphysical deities are, but also the function which they served in the religion. The supernatural beliefs are just philosophical and theological stances which try to describe what the defines the ultimate meaning of reality. New Atheism specifically, through its materialism, responds to this question by rejecting the supernatural ideas and proposing the new solution that the empirical world is what is ultimately real. While it lacks the supernatural qualities of older religions, the function is clearly very similar in that it dictates how one's life ought to be immediately lived.

The concept of Darwinism or the Big Bang serving as a creation myth also appropriate in regards to the function of both, which is to answer the question of why we are here.

I am looking at this as objectively as possible and saying that if one is to classify religion with certain standards, all other things meeting those standards ought to be considered a religion as well. New Atheism, especially from a functional viewpoint, is very much like a religion.

The underlying motive here is to suggest that Dawkins/Harris/Hitchens contradict themselves by advocating the eradication of religion through religion (not unlike every other religious conflict). In my opinion, it is as blind and aggressive as the most conservative Christian groups one can find, and both seem to irritate me quite a bit.