Quote:
Originally Posted by kermitology
I actually hold Atheism as a faith of sorts.. faith is something you believe in despite concrete evidence supporting it.
There is no empirical proof that God exists or does not exist. The absence of proof does not in itself prove that God does not exist.
So by that logic, an Atheist, claiming that there is no God, despite a lack of proof, is taking a leap of faith. Therefor, Atheism can be classified as a faith. A faith that there is nothing to have faith in. Odd..
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I would agree for the most part, but some things would need to be clarified.
First, what kind of atheist? There's the atheist that says exactly as you say, there is no empirical evidence that God exists, therefore they take the default logical position that there is no God until more evidence comes to light (weak atheist).
Then there's the strong atheist who would make a positive statement that there most probably or definitely is no God.
Which might seem like a position of faith, until you dig a bit deeper.
The first question to ask a strong atheist is "which God". Even Dawkins, probably as strong an atheist as you can get, says his confidence level in his position of no God depends on what definition of God you are using.
He says if you are using a vague pantheistic definition, or the idea of a God that watches but doesn't interfere with the universe, then his atheism isn't strong because as you say there's no way to tell. So Dawkins' atheism with respect to a deist's God might only be a 6 out of 10.
But if you use the definition of God as given in a set of scriptures (such as the Bible) then you CAN make a more definite judgment because there is in fact empirical evidence. There are specific claims about the properties of the God of the Bible, and if those claims can be demonstrated to be false, then that would be evidence against the God.
So an atheist may say a God may exist, but it isn't the God of the Bible (or Zeus or Odin or whoever else). An individual atheist may vary from weak to strong depending on which God it is.