Why do atheists care about the beliefs of others?

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I see two things that happen:

Religious people who think theirs is the only true religion and try to convert others.
Atheists who think that only Atheism is valid and try to convert others. (I maintain that Atheism is a belief, since it can't be proven.)

I have beliefs, but they're my beliefs. I don't want to even try to convince someone of them, because I think people have to come to their own conclusions about things.

It's a waste of breath, IMO, to try to unconvince someone of something they believe or to try to get someone to believe something they don't. Life's short, I don't intend to waste mine that way.

It's also a waste of my time for someone else to try to unconvince me of what I believe. It's also none of their business.

What I believe is for me to worry about, no one else.

Yes, beliefs can be dangerous, but most aren't, the most outlandish are usually simply limiting. If you've ever known someone who believed very strongly in something extreme and absurd and tried to reason with them, you soon find out that they really have to figure it out on their own.

To each his own. Don't push your beliefs in my face, and I won't push mine in yours. In fact, I won't likely push mine in yours anyway.

Atheism is NOT a belief. It is the denial of a belief for lack of evidence. Atheists rarely try to convince others that there is no evidence for the existence of the Abrahamic god. Why? Because it is obvious there is no empirical evidence for the existence of the Abrahamic god. Even believers admit it is a matter of faith, rather thank knowledge.

ruveyn

Exactly. I do not have a belief system based around whether the god Zeus does or does not exist. I do not have a belief system based around whether there are / are-not any unicorns living in my kitchen cupboard. I similarly do not have a belief system based around whether the god referred to in the Christian's bible does or does not exist.

In other words, Atheism is non-belief in "Theos" or supernatural "gods".

Therefore, if you believe on only one god, then that's just one more god than the Atheists believe in.

I didn't call Atheism a belief system, I called it a belief, and I'm not trying to insult anyone. The way I see it an Agnostic has no belief that there is or isn't a deity, but an Atheist does - that there is definitely no deity. You can call it whatever you want, that's just what I call it.

Sounds more like an issue with semantics. I'm not agnostic about whether there are unicorns living in my kitchen cupboard. I'm similarly not agnostic about whether the Christian's god exists or not.

Yes, though the dictionary seems to agree with my usage.

But it's neither here nor there to me whether someone believes in God or not.

The way I see it, if there is a God who punishes people for not believing what that same God hasn't been very obvious or convincing about revealing, then I'm more likely to side with nonbelievers. I have always considered myself spiritual, but I'm probably closer to being agnostic than religious. While I think there is a strong possibility that we have spirits or souls - and I am convinced we have psyches and wonder how different those things are - I'm not as strongly convinced of a single deity and especially not of a personified deity. I believe there probably is an afterlife if we have souls, but it's not a strong belief. It's not even an important belief to me, because if there is no afterlife, I won't be around to know the difference. I still think, afterlife or not, that what's important to us here is how we live this life.

Still, I think each person has to think these things through or ponder them for themselves. It's part of the human experience to do so, I think an important one. We are individuals, and our beliefs are as big a part of what makes us individual as our personalities, experiences, choices or actions.

If someone wants to believe Jesus will save their soul I have no argument with that, until they start trying to convince me, or govern me from their religious perspective. I was a Christian at one time, I've read the Bible. I don't need any more convincing or to study the matter any further, certainly no coercion. It's no one's business what I believe but my own.

I feel the same way about the beliefs I have, that it's no one else's place to tell me not to believe, any more than it is my place to tell them how to choose their clothing or what to eat for breakfast, providing they're harming no one else.

In the cases where religion becomes harmful, it doesn't seem to me that it's so much about a belief in God as it is about the differences in the details, mostly about how people should behave, and about tolerance toward other beliefs or nonbeliefs. The belief in God itself I don't find dangerous at all. How many times have we seen Christians killing Christians over belief? A lot. That's much more about the details and trying to control others than it is about belief itself.

I fully agree with you on that. People tend to be confused with my atheism advocacy when I am also quite a spiritual person and loosely speaking a Zen Buddhist. I rarely try to explain this, especially in PPR, it would be too difficult to communicate.

When I see that someone is wrong, I try to correct them.

I also firmly believe that religion is a horrible influence on society and has done (and continues to do) a great amount of damage.

Well, it just depends on the individual. Religion or lack of are both equally responsible for the state that society is in. Not all religions are "bad" or "good" It is not always black and white kind of a question. I hear a common meme of "Organized Religion" it is fair for me say Atheism is an religion, a religion of aesthetic pleasures and no objective moral compass and doing as you wish. The axe cuts both ways.

I can quote many Atheist of the top of my head and a quick Google search who are responsible for the destruction of society. Let's be fair in this discussion.

Best Regards,

Jake

Don't you mean organised and political religion? I don't give a fiddler's fart about someone's personal spiritual beliefs, as long as they don't try to take over the world with them or use them to control other people or demand special treatment for their beliefs.

Atheism just means a lack of a personal belief in any particular imaginary deity. You can be religious and a hedonist or atheist and extremely conservative and uptight. You mean hedonism, not atheism.

Nope. I mean more than that. Atheism is simply a superficial title. I can believe in the flying spaghetti monster, does it mean that it exist? No. I need conditions to validate my belief. Atheist have conditions to validate their belief, too.

Best Regards,

Jake

None. Hell is not for you.

No, atheism simply means a lack of belief in any God - a rejection of theism (i.e. deities).



Yes, like Christians, Muslims and Jews etc have all the proof in the world and have been proving it for, er...

What would be a term for someone who has never heard of any religion?

Some atheist will be funny and say "blessed"...