Atheism

Atheism is disbelief in, or denial of, the existence of a god or gods, or any supernatural entity.

Atheism is closely tied with Secular Humanism. Popularly-known Atheists and Secular Humanists include Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein, Stephen Jay Gould, Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins, William Borden and Sam Harris. Other famous atheists include Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot, Emilio Altieri and Stalin.

Atheist morality

Many atheists base their moral code upon emotion, experience and empirically derived ethics, such as those promoted by secular humanism. Atheists hold that neither the Bible, nor the Koran, nor the Torah, nor any religious text can be our only source of morality. This claim is made as all religious texts contain, and often ascribe to God, extremely immoral acts such as the Israelites driving out heathen nations from Canaan (i.e. ethnic cleansing), the stoning of homosexuals and adulterers to death, and the institution of slavery.

Atheists often subscribe to the secular humanist idea that it is far more ethical to do what is right because you believe that it is right, rather than because you fear divine punishment or desire divine reward. One example is illustrated in the following quote from Albert Einstein:

“A man’s ethical behaviour should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death”.

A modern example is the absurdity with which we view Islamist suicide bombers acting on a desire for 72 virgins in the afterlife. Atheism condemns this desire, along with other religious desires for exclusive reward (and the punishment of others) such as are found in all religious texts.

Origins

It is difficult to trace the origins of atheism as a result of the incomplete historic record. It may well be that atheism is the natural state of mankind, or belief in supernatural entities may have a biological origin against which reason has only recently reacted. It is known that ancient Greece produced a theory of materialism as early as the 5th century BC. The materialist world view was essentially mathematical and had no room for gods.

The Problem of Evil

A central argument against religious belief in all powerful entities ('gods') is the problem of evil. First identified by the philosopher and materialist Epicurus (341-270 BC), this problem points out the difficulty created by the mere existence of evil:

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing? then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?

Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

Atheism and Agnosticism

Atheism and agnosticism are logically distinct concepts. Whilst atheist reject the existence of a god or gods, agnostics do not do so. Richard Dawkins has contrasted the two positions as follows:

“There may be fairies at the bottom of the garden. There is no evidence for it, but you can’t prove that there aren’t any, so shouldn’t we be agnostic with respect to fairies?”.