Why do theists say it takes more faith to be an atheist than a theist?

Question

I'm an atheist, so I've experienced this belief in No God and I can say, whole-heartedly, that I do not use any faith to help me believe in No God.

So, why do theists always make this claim? Remember, we are all born atheists, we do not have an innate belief in God when we are born, we are taught to believe.

If a friend gives me a wallet and tells me there is money in the wallet, yet I see none, feel none and see no evidence of money, am I still using faith when I tell him that my belief is that there is no money in the wallet? Or is he using faith to support his belief that there is money?

Just because you believe that the world is amazingly complex and complicated and you believe that there is no way an eye could have evolved on its own doesn't mean I have to have more faith in a godless universe than you did.

I can't prove that something doesn't exist because you I don't know everything. But, I can create a belief system about the world based on my experiences. These experiences do not show me in any fashion that there is a God. Therefore, I'm an atheist. If I asked you if a yellow monster made of cookies exists, would you believe it? Probably not. Would you have faith that it doesn't exist? Probably not, you wouldn't need it. You'd probably look at your experience and come to the conclusion that it doesn't exist.

Lion - I see your points. All valid about the atheist baby. However, I am an adult and I have looked at the evidence presented for god and I take the positive position that He doesn't exist. I have no experience that would point to His existence, therefore have no reason to believe and thus, I don't.

People have told me to just ask God, with a whole and honest heart to prove His existence and he will. I did and never got an answer. So, I'm an atheist.

Lion - oh, by the way. The 'lack of belief' is exactly what makes an atheist. The letter A, in Greek before a root word means 'without' and theism means 'the belief in God'. So Atheism, quite literally means 'without the belief in God'. What you are arguing against is more of apathy or ignorance about the idea of God. Your cat is ignorant about God and the principles of God, so cannot be called an atheist because it can't understand the concept and deny it.

Eds - Yes it was very inprobable that the world as we know it came to be. HOWEVER, you have to remember that the universe is a gigantic amount of space with an unimaginible amount of planets. I would think that there is LESS of a probablility for a planet to exist in the entire universe without the life supporting elements than for there to be a planet like ours.

Lets say we know of 30 planets and we know that ours is the only one with life. Thats a 1/30 shot that a planet exists (without God) that supports life. Now we can figure that there is probably more than 1,000,000,000,000,000 planets that exist... do you really think out of all of those planets that came about naturally that there wouldn't be one planet out of all of those that couldnt support life and evolution.

By the way, this doesn't require faith. It's just probability.

Its getting more difficult to sort through all of the responses. If you'd actually like to discuss this with me, just message me.

Answer 1

What the...? I answered this question, and when I hit Preview, I got sent off to the Japanese version of Yahoo.
Weird.
Anyway, we figure that you need more faith because in denying a godly First Cause, you restrict yourself to a scientific viewpoint, which eventually leads to a blank wall. Life from nonlife is improbable to an order of about 10^29. That is essentially impossible. The serial coincidences required to create this universe and our planet as it must be to support life at all is similarly improbable to a very high degree. Taken together, your belief in these incredibly unlikely events occurring simply 'because we are here, so it must be', takes far more faith than I could work up.

Answer 2

I think that it takes "more faith to be an atheist" means that most atheist say that there is no proof of a God, and all the proof is of no God. Which implies that they are being logical and taking things by faith.

But, this position of logic fail when different items are brought up.
Like the Bible says humans and dinosaurs lived together, and evolution (logic) says they were millions of years apart. But there are places around the world were there are human and dinosaur footprints in the same rock. Also there are mammal footprints in rock that is suppose to be older than dinosurs. Also there are man made artifacts in many rock layer (suppose to be millions of years old).

Then there are these item.
The oceans are getting saltier (even with the polar caps melting). At the rate they are getting saltier they would have been fresh waster only a few thousand years ago (works out to about the time of the flood).
The moon is moving away from the earth. It would have been rolling on the surface of the earth only a few hundred thousand years ago. Plus there would have been a huge tidal wave following it not that long ago.
The helium level in our atmosphere should have stabalized in under 10,000 years, but it is still changing.

Then there is the spiritual side.
God promised to give us His Spirit and power.
If you go to a Pentecostal or Apostolic church you will most likely see people with such gifts (talking in tongues is the most common). You could ask them if they could pray for you to know that God is real, or that He would heal you or give you a prophesy (if they have these last two gifts).

So a atheist must ignore all these facts that point to God (either directly or because the Bible is true) and must by faith say that there is no God no matter how much evidence there is.

Answer 3

The reason theists make this claim is that they consider "God" to be a suitable explanation for anything they don't easily understand. How was the world made? God did it. Why are humans so smart? God did it. What is the meaning of life? Worshiping God. And so on and so on.

They just don't seem to get that God can't help people understand anything because no one really understands God. How can a being who nobody has seen, nobody has talked to (honestly), nobody can describe in absolute terms be a proper explanation for anything?

Answer 4

That is because it is so hard to escape their programming to see the reality atheists know so well!!! Acceptance of a supernatural claim tends to promote cooperative social relationships. This communication demonstrates a willingness to accept, without skepticism, the influence of the speaker in a way similar to a child's acceptance of the influence of a parent. By encouraging this kind of behavior where the most intense social relationships occur it facilitates the lack of skepticism and deters more open minded thinking. They are christian, Muslim or the other religions depending where they were born simply because they were indoctrinated by their parents as very young children. They will go on to indoctrinate their own children and those will go on to indoctrinate their grandchildren!! Atheists have the intellect to see through the conditioning and escape into the real world!! Agnostics have the intellect to see through the conditioning but lack the courage to throw of the conditioning entirely. Sadly Christians are still held firmly prisoner by the self perpetuating brainwashing!!

Answer 5

The sight of a non-believer must be puzzling, even threatening, to a person of faith. How can they NOT be convinced of something that convinces me? How can they not be convinced of ANYTHING? Obviously something has been missed. Is it a lack of instruction for them or a lack of critical analysis for me?

Everyone is capable of believing IN something abstract (liberty, equality, brotherhood, etc.). But believers confuse belief IN ideas with belief THAT certain things happened, happen or will happen. So if you can "believe" in something, anything (even a negative) outside yourself, it reassures them that their faith decision is valid.

In his book, "Breaking the Spell", Daniel Dennett argues that for many believers, the exercise of faith is more important than the content of that faith. One example Dennett uses is the suburban "megachurch". The building is constructed like a theater, with all the entertainment amenities. The pastor puts on a professional show, somewhat more blatantly than a traditional, mainline minister might dare to do. The doctrinal content is completely drained out. All you need to believe is that Jesus loves you (whoever he is). The rest of the message is instructions (usually on how to vote and whom to write your angry letters to). As religions go, it's a painless, popular, and very lucrative. The only requirement is that you have faith. They will assuredly tell you WHAT you believe.

In my experience, the most vociferous believers speak of their faith in terms of fact. They don't say, "I believe" but "I know". If they don't fact-ualize their belief, they find their anxiety levels increasing. Possibly recasting atheism as an act of "faith" somehow solidifies their faith decision as a "reality".

Answer 6

It's probably because being an athiest implies certain other beliefs associated with scientific study. Since it is difficult to meet the requirements of *proof*, science is filled with theories that are our best guess of how things work. We accept these best guesses as functional fact, but they remain, in the end, theories. Take gravity for instance. Gravity was good enough for a long time and is accepted as fact. It turns out to be only *mostly* correct, however, and has been refined over time by relativity and continues to receive refinement even now.

Which means that in the end, someone who believes in current scientific threories as a broad collection of "facts" has, in reality, a large number of "beliefs" that, while sufficient for most purposes, aren't 100% accurate. To further broaden this count, accepted theories change over time (as, for example, our understanding of geological events has moved from one based on steady, progressive change to a more convincing theory where periodic cataclysmic events carry more weight).

Taken together, this is a lot of belief. Contrast that with a "theist" who has only one important source of belief to guide their life. This is much simpler than placing your trust so fully in broad and ever-changing human invention.

Answer 7

comparing a tangible substance to an intangible entity outside time and space is ill gathered and philisophically irresponsible. unwavering support for the existence of god by millions should be your first clue. not a reason to believe there is a god, but only to corroborate that the possibility cannot be discounted. while there is no tangible proof of god, there is also no tangible proof that there is not a god. faith is a spectrum with polar opposites at which nobody rests at absolute zero. our tools cannot prove nor disprove the existence of god beyond a shadow of a doubt. that's why it takes faith whether you believe it or not to believe whatever you choose to believe.

Answer 8

Theists make that claim because they don't have a good answer for points made about the origin of the current 'faiths.'

It's like they think we have to have faith to NOT believe in the great pumpkin. Naaaa.

Answer 9

I'm a Christian, and yes you are right. Atheists do not need faith. They just don't believe in God. Altough, many of the things atheists believe in, such as the big band, which goes against the laws of physics (everything goes to disorder, etc.) and evolution. Of which both require faith, because they're are both theories, they have no scientific evidence to make them completely true, therefore it requires faith to believe they are true. Also, my belief is that evolution is completely false, for one main reason, if everything started out as one celled bacterium, they were perfectly fine, why would they, and how could they gain DNA to change into different organims. Bacteria are thee most simple, efficient form of life on this planet. They have no need to change, so I don't see why they would. Although, I will confess it is possilbe, unlikely in my mind, but possible.

Answer 10

I certainly don't. I think it takes more faith to believe in a religion then not to. After all, it's easy to put your faith in science, in something you can see now and touch now and worry about now. But to let that faith stretch to what you can't see, or touch, or feel, to worry about the events that will happen after death and to think about it - I think that requires more faith and is harder. Everyone who is religious, be it Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Pagans, etc, they have a stronger faith because they rely on something that is not seen with the human eye, but felt with the soul.