Is atheism a belief?

[Belacqua]

You might care to examine their reasons, but unless they have a compelling reason to do so, I would in fact say that they should NOT bother to examine them themselves.  This is because there are very many (like, millions) of claims which one might respond to, and examining your personal motivations in your positions on each of them would bring your ability to move through life to a grinding halt.

Well, I just think that whenever we evaluate and accept or reject a claim, it is good for us to know why we do that. 

Granted, no one has time to evaluate every claim in the world. And we all use filters -- I don't bother with the claims of Ken Ham. 

Again, my main point is just to get past the fact that atheism is pure lack. Adult atheists hold certain things to be true, use these things to evaluate claims, and reach conclusions based on that. 

That's the thing I want to express-- that religious arguments between religious-minded and atheist folks are asymmetrical: one party cares more than the other, bears a greater burden of proof, requires much tighter arguments and better evidence, and so on.  If atheists really had a vested interest in changing YOUR mind, then they'd have a much harder time of things.

But I have always been an atheist, and I feel a responsibility to improve my thinking as much as possible. Maybe this is just me -- I have some personal motivation to understand things well. Maybe my fellow atheists are content to accept or reject claims on a whim, but I hope we can all do a bit better than that.