“Tenets of atheism? What?!

The Tenets of Atheism

Atheists claim with fervency that they lack faith. But atheists indeed have positive beliefs, not just “lack of belief.” And as it is with any religion, not all atheists subscribe to all the below tenets. Yet nonetheless, they nicely capture the religiosity of atheism.

I. I believe the universe does not need a creator.

II. I believe the laws of physics, the underlying order in nature, are a “given”. I presuppose them to be unchanging brute facts and I need not consider their origin.

III. I believe a priori against the possibility of miracles. No matter where science points, it is impossible to point to a supernatural cause because I won’t accept it no matter what.

IV. I believe in the feasibility of the universe popping into existence from absolute nothingness (ex-nihilo) despite the philosophical absurdity of such a notion and total lack of any evidence that nothing can “do something”. Cosmic fluctuations that create universes don’t require faith.

V. I believe that nothingness can “borrow energy” to whip out an uncaused universe. Even though the act of borrowing is a verb, I still believe that absolute nothingness can perform actions and the “void” keeps a record of its debt and will eventually demand to be paid back.

VI. I believe the total sum of energy in the universe is zero, though for obvious reasons, I have no possible way to prove it. Shhh….just don’t call it faith.

VII. I believe in the feasibility that the universe does not need a cause- if the universe needs a cause like everything else, then I would have to be a theist (or at minimum a supernaturalist), and I don’t want that, so I’ll just ‘default’ to asserting uncaused events. I don’t need faith to believe this.

VIII. I believe that science can discern all truth even though this faith-based belief cannot be proven.

IX. I believe that all of us, including you, have no more objective value than a bag of mostly water or a random heap of 7.12 X 10²⁷ atoms piled high. All human value is subjective.

X. I believe in a cosmic principle that states, “wherever conditions for life exist, life will somehow squirm itself out.” Despite having no proof of this, I just believe it.

XI. I believe in advanced alien life. And, like Hawking, DeGrasse Tyson, Sagan and many others, I believe they are benevolent. There just has to be alien life out there. I believe! The burning in my bosom tells me so. I take hope and comfort in knowing we aren’t alone.

XII. I need that sense of hope because it’s too depressing not to have at least *some* hope and since I have rejected God, those benevolent aliens are all I’ve got.

XIII. I considered God and rejected him (unbelief), making my denial of God an active denial and not a passive, “default” position of nonbelief. Deep down, I know that my rejection of God is not the same thing as rejecting a million other potential Gods or a ‘spaghetti monster”. I know full well the identity of the God I’m rejecting.

By Arthur Hunter