Does Atheism Require More Faith Than Religious Views?

    "Really, when it boils down to it, atheism is no better based in fact than religion.  In fact, it requires more, if not, just as much faith as its religious counterparts"

    All to often this kind of nonsense is spouted out about atheists and non-believers in general, the claims that their view is dependent on faith, or that is requires a sort of "leap" similar to Kierkegaard's Cartesian doll analogy where there is a lack of evidence and rash conclusions are made.  However, this is not the case at all.  Growing up in the South and attending private school has taught me a lot about religion but has also brought copious amounts of criticism from self proclaimed masters of theology (mainly, my peers, who are very young and as naive as me) and it gets rather irritating.  One of my hero's, so to say, or rather, someone that I have great admiration for is a gentleman whom many people have heard of, and probably have either great adulation or contempt for; Christopher Hitchens.  Hitchens purports that one should not write merely because they want to, or because they expect to receive something for it such as money or simply doing it because of a belief that it will bring respect, but rather because one feels obligated, or called to do so.  In this case, I very much feel the need to write on the topic.  Perhaps on another short work I will go through my background in order to establish a more concrete reason for why I may have authority to speak on this issue of theology, and more specifically Roman Catholicism, but for the intent of this short essay, I'd like to address my title, that is, "Does Atheism Require More Faith Than Religious Views?" or does it at least require a tantamount amount of faith.  The short answer; no.

     The thing is, many people seem to have a contorted, wretched view of atheists and do not understand the true ideas behind the thought process.  Simply put, atheism requires absolutely no faith whatsoever.  Instead, atheism is based purely off of the little we do know.  The main problem opponents of atheists or secularists in general bring up is that they claim to know god does not exist.  Ostensibly, some atheist may make ridiculous assertions including the notion that one can disprove god with science or math but this is not the true meaning behind atheism or, more specifically, agnostic-atheists (which is the proper term for the majority of all the "atheists" I've met that share a similar belief).  It would make the most sense to first clear up the problem of atheism and that is that there are two different, mutually exclusive, types of atheism  The first is gnostic-atheists, who claim that they know that god does not exist (where do they get this false claim to knowledge that the majority of the population lacks?  Who know, I certainly do not) and there are agnostic-atheists (it's important to not that the vast majority of people who claim to be atheists generally adhere to this school of thought and not the former).  An agnostic-atheist takes position in the fact that they lack knowledge, unlike the majority of religions that claim to have some special sort of hidden truth that the rest of us lack.  Here is the basic premise behind the majority of atheists (i.e. agnostic-atheists) and that is that by default, we are born atheists.  When we are first born, we have no knowledge of Heaven, Hell, or any sort of deity.  Now as we grow older, we may develop theses theories or perhaps have been introduced to them from various people (family, friends, etc) but one is not born inherently with a belief in god, in fact one is not born with a belief in anything inherently, but rather the ability to derive at such conclusions later on in life.  Because of this, there is no natural reason to assume the position that a god exists, nor does it make sense to claim that it is a natural position to believe that god does not exits.  Instead, we have a lack of belief entirely.  This is the atheist's argument essentially, there is no belief that god does not exist, such a claim would be immensely difficult to support, especially since there is not even an agreed upon image or set of values granted to such a deity even amongst believers.  For the infidel, it is rather simple, instead of making conclusions about the supernatural, in both the affirmative and negative ends of the spectrum, he chooses to abstain from any sort of claims to knowledge and repose his convictions in the name of ignorance and the quest for more information.  Without conclusive evidence, I repudiate any efforts to make such claims of knowledge without any sort of evidence.  Just as Plato would define knowledge as a "justifiable true belief" (granted this definition can pose problems, as posed by Gettier, but this will suffice for now) it makes the most sense to withhold conviction and such bold claims of intellect on a topic which we know very little about.  The case of the atheist is that we do not have enough evidence to believe in the exist of a deity, so there is no real reason to hold such as belief.  Consequently, there is also no reason to believe that one could not exist either, so an atheist will withhold from foolish conviction that they can claim any sort of knowledge that a god does not exist.  So it becomes very important when discussing theories on theology that one knows that atheists do not claim to have a belief that god does not exist, but rather it is simply a lack of belief that one does exist (and it is also imperative to note the difference between these two opposing views and to not make the mistake of confusing them. 
    
     After taking into account all of the ideas and positions held by the atheist, it makes it seem rather boorish to postulate that atheism requires more faith than the stance of a religious advocate.  While it can certainly be a reasonable mistake to make, it is one that should be faced immediately and not seen as acceptable to be made again.  If religious individual truly wishes to convert, or to at least have an ineligible discussion or discourse with another individual who lacks faith, then it is truly imperative to understand what the opponent is saying, this holds particularly true in debate in order to ensure one is not guilty of attacking a "straw man" and inaccurately identifying the positions of his colleagues.  Now don't get me wrong, both camps are certainly guilty of such misinterpretations and representations of the opposing side that they debate with (it hurts me to say, that even Mr Hitchens has fallen prey to this reprehensible mistake in discourse with the Catholic church) and in fact, I will certainly be writing from the opposing side as well.  While I consider myself to be an agnostic-atheist, I am also very much of a Catholic apologetic in the sense that while I do not agree with the Catholic church on many issues, I also do not care for the unwarranted or misplaced attacks on the institution.  The main topics of that discussion tend to fall along the lines of homosexual marriage and evolution which often get contorted by charlatans claiming the position and authority of the Catholic church (most notably, William "Bill" Donohue, for who I have a severe contempt for).  But, these are topics for the future, and I now rest my case for the faithless atheist, as it should be.

Reviews

[Chloe]

I really appreciate this piece. You've, in a perfectly articulate and grammatically correct manner, described everything I've always wanted to type into the limited barriers of YouTube comments.

[LamentedHaven]

I recently wrote a commentary about atheism being a faith. Do you not realize that you are exercising faith when you assume the age of the earth, assume unobservable evolution (the transition of an animal to another animal) assume the big bang formed the universe and assume God does not exist.