Sunday, February 11, 2007

What "Fundamentalist Atheism" might be

I just came across a post on an Atheist blog called The one with Aldacron about "Fundamentalist Atheism" (via Deep Thoughts. )
I certainly share the main sentiments of the blog: Christians who don't understand the difference between wanting to go back to the bronze age and just being hardline Atheist, get no respect from me.

But being in a very philosophical mood, I decided to post some views about the issue.

"Fundamantelist" has become a term to be used about everyone who are very concerned with something. No doubt, the reason for Theists to use it against Atheists is that they want to get a break from very real accusations of fundamentalism. You know, the accusations about terror and violence done in the name of God, referring to a holy scripture accompanied by a "Let's go back to year 0!" attitude. It doesn't stick at all.

However:
The term "Fundamentalist Atheist" can have a meaning, like this:

We already speak of "hard" and "soft" Atheists, but the fundament for Atheism is that there is no god. Not that there is no god like there is no pink unicorn.
But if the boundaries of Atheism get blurred, then "No belief in God" is its fundament.
In this respect, the hard Atheist will insist on Atheism in its purest form, while the softie will open for a certain doubt, albeit theoretical. Some may even be almost Agnostics.

There are even some (but hopefully few) who see Atheism as purely relating to gods - not, say, spirits and those damn pink unicorns. In fact, this type could very well claim to be a fundamentalist Atheist because Atheism as a term do not technically have anything to do with spirits or pink unicorns. "God" does not cover "spirits" and it is not Aspirituality or Apinkunicornism. But I sure hope that this is only a theoretical problem, or we will have to find a new term.
(I do happen to know of a self-proclaimed Atheist who mocked Christians, but believed in Von Däniken theories...)

Well, having said all this, I think (as was the point with the blog post) that the term "Fundamentalist Atheist" as it is used by religious people is completely absurd. However, it can have a meaning as a "back to basics" form of Atheism.

2 comments:

JDHURF said...

You make an interesting argument. Fundamentalism with regards to religion is simply that particular religion being adhered to literally as it is laid out within the corollary religious text. Atheisms fundamental principle is the disbelief in god, or supernaturalism in general, thus fundamentalist atheism is simply the literal affirmation of this elementary maxim.

Bertsura said...

The term "fundamentalist atheism" would only make sense if there were any good evidence to support the existence of gods.