Is atheism a belief?

[GrandizerII]

atheism happens to be the default conclusion when examining the overall evidence. To get to theism, you have to make a big leap (an unwarranted one in my perception). If you do not make that leap, you're generally going to stop at atheism because atheism doesn't require any such leap. 

Thank you for being civil! It's a pleasure to have a conversation with you.

Likewise.

I'm thinking about atheism as the default condition. This sounds to me as if we grow up in total ignorance of religious claims and then, after our reason is up and working (if it ever gets there) start to consider the problems. 

But aren't the majority of people in the world raised with religious ideas floating in the environment? Being raised in ignorance of religion or by atheist parents must be pretty rare, maybe until quite recently. So for a lot of little ones, religion will be the default, and getting out of it will require some rethinking. For them, that's where the big leap comes in. As always, it will be easier for some than for others. And I suspect some people ditch religion for bad reasons (the nuns were mean), and then rummage around for better reasons after.

I agree the default position (from childhood) for many would be theism (due to tradition and authority and such). But my point is that when children or adults start to think about this subject intellectually, and go about it by "resetting their thoughts" and starting with common assumptions that both sides generally make (without presupposing either theism or atheism), what happens is that atheism is naturally the default conclusion, so those who are not prone to think "theistically" will stop at atheism. Those who are prone to think "theistically" will not be satisfied with atheism because their intuition strongly disagrees with such a conclusion, so they go for the best explanation that satisfies them (but to get there they have to make a leap that is not based on reason but more on their intuition).

As for presuppositionalist theists (like Sye Ten Bruggencate), I don't think they're thinking about the subject in an intellectual manner. So they may as well be in the same category as the child who is a theist because they were raised as such.

That's how I personally see it, at least.

ETA: All that said, atheism is a lack of belief in gods, even if intellectual atheists hold beliefs that lead them to atheism as the conclusion. No one is saying that atheists don't hold beliefs that cannot be adequately backed up by science itself (or at least I think no one is).