(May 24, 2015 at 10:39 am)Dystopia Wrote: So, in your opinion, every small critique of religion or theism is anti-theism? I don't see the relevance of this to the OP - I'm just arguing that the process of not believing in a society where most believe is active, even if the position, in its core, is a passive one, both philosophically and scientifically.Sorry, I must not have made my point clear. Atheism is the default position because there is an absence of theism at birth and unless one is taught theism, it won't arise except as an exception. This is demonstrable as both individuals and societies are found in which no theism has arisen. So whilst 'belief' seems to be a natural human trait (with the exception of some psycho/sociopathies), those beliefs aren't necessarily theistic. My reference to the conflation of a/anti-theism was to illustrate the reason why people confuse atheism as a belief thus leading to the error in assumption of the default position.
Atheism is, by definition, passive as one need take no action in order to be or remain atheistic: an absence of something can do nothing. As soon as one becomes active in any matter, one is applying a value system not an absence of one.
Also it's technically correct (the best kind of correct
) to refer to every position 'in opposition to theism' as 'antitheism'. That's what the word means. Whether an individual would be described as 'an antitheist' for holding a small number of such positions, I would think is highly unlikely. There must be some tipping point in public perception where enough views are held/publicised or are of sufficient impact for people to use the gross categorisation 'antitheist'.
Sum ergo sum
