Different types of pseudo-atheists

What do they believe? What do you think? Talk about religion as it exists today.

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John T
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Joined: Thu May 15, 2014 8:57 am

Different types of pseudo-atheists

Post by John T »

How many different types of pseudo-atheists are there and what is the definition of a real atheist?

It should go without saying that just because you don't believe the stories in the Bible does not make you an atheist. Yet...

"...roughly one-in-five self-described atheists (18%) say they do believe in some kind of higher power. None of the atheists we surveyed, however, say they believe in “God as described in the Bible.”...https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2 ... -atheists/

Just like Christianity, atheism has different beliefs/denominations.
I have only meet a few so-called atheists in my life-time. But after asking some personal questions it turns out they are not atheists at all (not even agnostic) but rather had a bad experience with religious figures. In others words, out of emotion they consider themselves an atheist but not due to reasoning.

Are there any real atheists on this forum or are they just mythicists pretending to be atheists? :confusedsmiley:
ABuddhist
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Re: Different types of pseudo-atheists

Post by ABuddhist »

John T wrote: Fri Mar 24, 2023 3:27 am Are there any real atheists on this forum or are they just mythicists pretending to be atheists? :confusedsmiley:
Do you draw a distinction between materialistic and non-Materialistic atheism? I do. Jainism, Scientology, and Buddhism I classify as non-materialistic Atheism, because although they deny that an uncreated creator god exists and asert that the universe arose through natural processes, they assert that (and I as a Buddhist believe) that there is more to the universe than the purely physical or what arises from the purely physical.

Conversely, Muggletonianism was a fascinating Christian sect which was theistic but materialistic, asserting that nothing could live without a physical body - not even YHWH.
Last edited by ABuddhist on Wed Mar 29, 2023 10:18 am, edited 1 time in total.
davidmartin
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Re: Different types of pseudo-atheists

Post by davidmartin »

This is the problem. If you were to send a news reporter back in time to interview the historical Jesus would we expect Jesus to talk 'normal' like he was just another guest on the program. No. He would define the 'state of consciousness' of the interview and start interviewing the interviewer. You can see just such a phenomena if you go on youtube and watch lee scratch perry being interviewed - he refuses to engage with the consciousness state of his surroundings and projects his own massively/madly. This is honest and a good thing to aspire to. I think labels are just the crudest tool in the box, what do you call someone that is always walking around with a fig leaf in their hand?

Another example i picked up watching 'Jews for Judaism', the anti-missionary channel on youtube. The host describes a multi-faith gathering of Jews, Christians and Muslims and how at the lunch break (over quiche probably) the assembled gathering split into various chattering groups. To his surprise they did not split along faith lines at all, instead the more liberal Jews, Christians, and Muslims associated with each other and the more traditional with the more traditional. I found this funny. What are labels?
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