Thanks for your comment. Interesting that you deny the existence of atheists! I have a few questions for you. I hope you’re not really putting your hands over your ears.

Firstly, why do you think that there “must be something after death”?

Also, why do you conflate atheism with there being nothing after death? Atheism is simply not believing in gods. Some atheists do believe there is something after death, such as reincarnation. As it happens I don’t believe this, but the idea of there being something after death is not the same as the existence or not of gods.

Atheists don’t believe in any gods. I’m sure you don’t believe in all gods, there must be many many gods you are perfectly capable of not believing in. In respect of those “other” (false?) gods you are atheistic. So why do you think it impossible to go “one god further” and believe in none. For example, if you’d never heard of the idea of gods, then you couldn’t believe in one. This is implicit atheism.

An idea is that people need explanations of the things they see – moon, sun, stars, nature. As long as science hadn’t evolved enough, atheistic ideas were never really brought to the surface because they couldn’t answer those questions. Maybe this is also why varieties of Hinduism and Buddhism were – because they (if I’m not mistaken) often say that existential questions are unecessary and takes away your focus. Also, since its trail of thoughts is all-inclusive, it’s understandable that atheism, or at least agnostic thought, have been around there more, and have had a possibility to raise its voice. In short – in west we need explanations. No science, no atheism. In east they didn’t feel the need for any explanations.

Of course science can never give answers to the existential questions. But it answers the small simple questions as “does the sun drown when it goes down into the sea”…

I know a scientist who, as a youngster, thought science has all answers, and there’s no need for God. As he developed the studies (he is today a physician and mathematician) he discovered that science is all based on unproven axioms, and that there’s nothing scientific that contradicts the existence of God, as science is limited and does not have “access” to the spiritual realm.

It didn’t make him Christian, that was a much later story, but it made him an agnostic.

This entry had less to do with the blog post than I intended. Sorry.

Yes, I’m aware it’s a Bible verse, although that doesn’t make it less offensive, nor any more likely to convert me.

Pure belief in no God at all – atheism – was pretty much non-existant 3000 years ago.

Hmm, now you’re in the ironic position of needing to prove a negative. :-)

You know just because something isn’t mentioned in the Bible, that doesn’t mean it didn’t exist or didn’t happen.

As atheism is probably the only world-view you can reach on your own (the others all require you to hear the story), it seems very unlikely that there wouldn’t be some people who’d be atheists. I’ve not got the time right now to research this in detail, but a quick look shows ancient varieties of Hinduism and Buddhism were atheistic.

“The thoroughly materialistic and anti-theistic philosophical Cārvāka School that originated in India around 6th century BCE is probably the most explicitly atheistic school of philosophy in India.”

By the way, the slogan is a Bible verse. It’s the only Bible verse ever to talk about atheism at all. Probably because it didn’t really exist at that time. Many scholars believe that the passage’s underlying meaning is that the fools say that “there is no God to me”, or “God doesn’t help me” or “is not interested in me”. Pure belief in no God at all – atheism – was pretty much non-existant 3000 years ago.

“Whosoever shall say, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hellfire.”

Burn, Trinitarians, burn!