Explain the rejection of belief in deities / new atheism. A

intro

rejection of religion can be traced back to ancient greece, where aristotle wrote “prayers and sacrifices to gof are of no avail”

this rejection developed through the ‘enlightenment era’ where philosophers like bentham, mill and hume criticised religious ideas

from the 1960s to present day atheism has become a social norm, howver there are varying degrees to athiests beliefs

P1 - Atheism vs Agnosticism

anthony flew describes atheism as “a psychological state ; the state of not believing in the existence of god” and introfuced the terms ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ atheism in his book ‘the presumption of atheism’

‘weak’ atheism is where the athiest doesnt make positive claims that god doesnt exist, they are “simply not a theist”

‘strong’ atheism is where the atheist defends their belief, “someone who positively asserst the non-existence of god”

some further types of atheists are ‘protest’ atheists, which is a revolt against god on moral grounds, e.g. Ivan in ‘the brothers Karamazov’

richard dawkins presents ‘new atheism’ in his book, ‘the god delusion’, this is someone who has a hostile reaction to theism and believes religion is a threat to humanity

thomas huxley coined the term ‘agnostic’ which means ‘without knowledge’

the types of agnosticism are ‘strong’ where it is impossible to know whether god exists, ‘weak’ where the evidence for gods existence is only currently unknown, and ‘protest’ where no amount of debate can prove or disprove the existence of god

P2 - The Rise of New Atheism

roots traced back to bertrand russel in ‘why i am not a christian’

the term was coined in 2006 by gary wolf, in an attempt to describe the actions of some 21st century athiests, and their beliefs in the dangers of religion

after 9/11 many people started to become new atheiests, as they thought that belief in god was harmful and dangerous

it is fronted by 4 influential figures, richard dawkins, christopher hitches, daniel dennett, and sam harris, who are known as “the four horsemn of the non-apocalypse”

hitchens say “the effect of religious belief is postively harmful”

P3 - Criticims of Religion

they gave 3 main criticisms of religion, these are

religion is ‘non-thinking’, dawkins argued that religion involves faith, and faith by nature is opposed to evidence, “faith is not allowed to justify itself by argument”, in ‘the god delusion’ dawkins argues that religious people are brought up unquestioning, so faith is infantile, he likens faith to belief in santa claus, “whoever believes in him will believe in anything” says hitchens

religious people have an ‘infantile worldview’, new athiesm sees the religious views of reality as deficient and impoversihed, in contrast to the bold and brilliant vision that science offers. dawkins calls organised religion “a poky little medieval universe and extremely limited”

religious belief ‘impedes scientific progress’, new athiesm affirms a materialistic world-outlook, with scientific theories based on evidence, whereas religion is irrational and superstitious, it leads to blind faitha nd “religious fundamentalism” subvert science. dawkins sees religion as “hell-bent on ruining the scientific education of thousands of young minds and religion in general furthering the idea that unquestioning faith is a virtue”