It's actually quite a shitty article, but it comes from a fairly terrible website so hey, what do you expect. Lets take a look at the dumb things its author wrote:
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It also creates a false dichotomy between science (which they claim must be naturalistic and secular) and religion.
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Atheism has nothing to do with science or naturalism. A newborn baby is by definition an atheist, and yet it more than likely holds no strong opinions about naturalism or secularism. Atheism is the
lack of belief in gods, and people who do not believe in gods run the gamut from Luddite naturists to smarmy biologists from England.
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Atheism will be defined in the contemporary western sense: not just the lack of belief in a god, but the assertion about the non-existence of any gods, spirits, or divine or supernatural beings.
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No, it won't be defined as this, for the same reason that Christianity won't be defined as the assertion that there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet. There are atheists who define their opinion toward the divine as a lack of belief in gods without the assertion as to their non-existence. If Daniel Smartt and Creation.com want to turn their detractors into a competing religion, they would be better served making a new term rather than hijacking an existing one.
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Evolution is an explanation of where everything came from: the cosmos (came out of nothing at the big bang—nothing exploded and became everything)
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Evolution has nothing to do with the big bang theory, the origin of the Earth, or the origin of life on Earth. Evolution is the change in frequency of inherited characteristics within a population of organisms over time. That's it.
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The testimony of those who after learning about evolution in “science” reject Christianity should alert church leaders to the incompatibility between evolution and the Gospel.
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There are many Christians who understand evolution and realize it is compatible with their religion.
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Atheistic denial of the divine entails denial of an afterlife.
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No it doesn't.
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If there is no afterlife, then ultimately is no higher purpose in life for Atheists than to be happy.
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Atheism is not hedonism. So, no, another stupid assertion!
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According to the Humanist Manifesto II, the only meaning in life is what the person gives it. In the Humanist Manifesto III, this was changed to finding meaning in relationships.
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Atheism is not Humanism.
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Belief in evolution also causes people to aim for self preservation and to spread their own genes.
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And he cites Dawkins' book as a reference. Dawkins has one daughter and no sons. Clearly a man feverishly obsessed with spreading his genes.
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On the other hand, Atheism requires “faith” (using their own definition) that the laws of chemistry, physics and biology were once violated and life arose from non-life via chemical evolution.
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Atheism has nothing to say about how life arose.
And so on and so on. You seriously thought this article was worth posting? Sorry, man, but it's a hell of a lot of bullshit. The author has no idea what atheism is, no idea what evolution is, and really is just totally out of touch with the subjects he's attempting to write about.
But you made a comment about overall message. Okay, overall message. What the author is saying is that atheism is really Atheism (big A), and is a religion. He's saying the adherents of Atheism share beliefs, ethos, and other qualities which make them effectively a religion despite not believing in a god. He is, of course, wrong. And dumb. Not believing in god says nothing about the person. Being an "atheist" is a meaningless quality, by definition. It simply indicates a lack of a certain category of beliefs. But atheists range from Stalin to Warren Buffett -- a brutal dictator to a modest philanthropist. What do those two men have in common? Do they share ethics? Beliefs? Rituals? And yet they're both atheists.
What this idiot writer means to indicate is that he is disturbed by the ability of Dawkins to rally a tiny fraction of what was once a group of people barely aware of each others existence into a very minor and inconsequential social movement. Where once atheists had no distinct presence, now there are tiny murmurs from within Christian-dominated societies. So, clearly, atheism has become a dangerous new religion called Atheism, and its morally devoid followers are busy waging war against their rival religion, Christianity, in order to impose their Marxist, Darwinist view of spreading their genes and having faith in thermodynamics. Meanwhile, back on Earth, Dawkins is virtually unknown to most people, most people who would call themselves atheists don't care what he has to say, and Christians getting their granny panties in a wad over it is a sign of something much larger.
That is, people aren't so easily indoctrinated when they have easy access to the Internet. Free-flow of information is the death of superstitious garbage. The power of the Christian demographic is waning. Young people are more atheistic, and more liberal than ever. And this, indeed, is a scary thing for the current power base to come to terms with.
2012-04-08, 04:14 AM
Linear Mode
