I say that there are definitely no gods, just as I say there are definitely no easter bunnies and definitely no integers n > 2 for which there are integers a, b, and c such that a**n = b**n + c**n. Saying “definitely” does not imply that the claimant couldn’t possibly be wrong — not in any rational epistemology. Yes of course there’s a deductive proof of the last case, but the proof could be wrong, with some small likelihood … but a somewhat larger likelihood than that I could be wrong that there is no god.

The fact is that the great majority of self-proclaimed atheists and agnostics are “strong atheists” in this sense; they’ve just been cowed by religious oppression into hedging on their own rational expectations in re the existence of god. If religion had never been invented, none of these “weak atheists” and agnostics would have the slightest reason to speculate on the existence of a god — whatever the heck that is.

Is Zen a religion? It is not a religion in the sense that the term is popularly understood; for Zen has no God to worship, no ceremonial rites to observe, no future abode to which the dead are destined, and, last of all, Zen has no soul whose welfare is to be looked after by somebody else and whose immortality is a matter of intense concern with some people. Zen is free from all these dogmatic and “religious” encumbrances. …

As to all those images of various Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and Devas and other beings that one comes across in Zen temples, they are like so many pieces of wood or stone or metal; they are like camellias, azaleas, or stone lanterns in my garden. Make obeisance to the camellia now in full bloom, and worship it if you like, Zen would say. There is as much religion in so doing as in bowing to the various Buddhist gods, or as sprinkling holy water, or as participating in the Lord’s Supper. All those pious deeds considered to be meritorious or sanctifying by most so-called religiously minded people are artificialities in the eyes of Zen. It boldly declares that “the immaculate Yogins do not enter Nirvana and the precept-violating monks do not go to hell”. This, to ordinary minds, is a contradiction of the common law of moral life, but herein lies the truth and the life of Zen. Zen is the spirit of a man. Zen believes in its inner purity and goodness. Whatever is superadded or violently torn away, injures the wholesomeness of the spirit. Zen, therefore, is emphatically against all religious conventionalism. … ”

( that sure should be enough food for thought for a while. )

Again what’s wrong with that??
Buddhism is no ‘tooth fairy’ and ’santa claus’ story.

Its only foolish and ignorance to dismiss something without even understanding it first.

Statements like “I do exactly that thought experiment and I find the it almost always does make sense, including Buddhism.” only shows the authors ignorant and jaundiced view of anything that gets tagged as religion.

I wonder if it actually pays to know what you are talking about……….

That’s (Zen) Buddhism philosophy in a nutshell for you.

Now, what’s wrong with that?

If you’re anything like me, even if you’re not 100% positive there is no God (you’d have to be dense to think there’s 100% certainty in almost anything), you would be willing to lay your life on the line and bet that there’s sure as hell no God that matches up with what Christians mean when they say it, and you see the possibility that the Bible is correct as written as so unlikely that it might as well be zero. In that case, it’s a little dishonest to pretend that you possess any of the “openness” to (their) religion that religious try to read into the word “agnostic.”

Really, most atheists (probably 99% or more) acknowledge that they don’t _know_ for sure that there’s no God; all they really mean is that it seems impossibly unlikely that there is a God that matches any of the major religions. Hedging that near certainty with a weak word like agnostic is just not appropriate.

Atheism is a not a religion. Atheism means non-theism, a person who is not a theist. There is indeed something called “strong atheism”, which describes somebody who says there definitely is no gods, but I have never heard of anyone who seriously holds such a odd position. Atheism does not describe a dogma, it is simply a lack of belief. If you were to propose that something like Secular Humanism was a religion, then there might be more to talk about (but not much more IMO).

I am an atheist in so much as I don’t see any evidence for gods, and so no reason to think that it might be true. I don’t see how that can be classed a religion. As it happens, I am very interested in religion as a cultural phenomenon, and like debating the subject, but I can’t see how that can be classed a religion either.

It seems to me that, by any measure, if you call atheism a religion you are warping the word “religion” so much that it becomes meaningless.

Your mistake is to assume that Agnosticism and Atheism are mutually exclusive. That is, you assume the set of Atheists and the set of Agnostics are disjoint. Once you understand what Agnosticism means, you will look back at your mistake with as much absurdity as the following proposition, “Atheists are wrong. It is much more rational instead to dye your head purple. At least then there are no ideas to cling on to”.

If you are to claim to be Agnostic, I implore you to understand what it means (makes sense right?).

Enjoy your journey into epistemology

Atheism is just another religion, though not organized and pretty much harmless. Any time you cling to an idea with certainty you become religious.

Agnosticism makes more sense. I don’t know the answers to the questions, and I would be foolish to think I do.

Being an agnostic I identify more with atheists, though, as I think organized religion is mostly pretty disgusting to me. I think some atheists are actually agnostics in that they think there is no god, but accept that they could be wrong.