Does Atheism Lead to Nihilism?

Anton

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Even in my days as an athiest i felt my life had purpose it just was a purpose of my own design
Sure... subjective purpose can exist and sort of mean something. If you were to distract yourself enough with playing video games or posting on the coli, you wouldn't have to think much about "existential angst" or whatever as an atheist, and you could callously ignore this major problem.
 

Reflected

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atheism - there is no god aka life doesn't have an objective purpose.

Existential Nihilism - there isn't objective value or purpose to life.

theism - the belief in the existence of a supreme being.

atheism basically necessitates existential nihilism because there can't be objective purpose.


Fair enough.

Atheists negate the proposition "God is real", not "god is real", big difference. The word "God" refers to the Abrahamic god, "god" refers to the possibility of any god existing.

Now, if there could only be "God", no "god", hypothetically speaking, yes, at face value, there would be a natural extension towards the lack of objective meaning IF, and this is important, IF the atheist says "God is not real" and accepts "meaning" as only being derived from something assigned interpedently of the mind, in this case "God".


So under those parameters, at face value (aka my understanding), yes, a natural extension, but under the academic understandings of these positions (for argument sake), there is no natural extension. I hope that in this reply you can see I'm aiming towards settling the fact of the matter as opposed to fighting for some side. When you say there is a natural extension, under my understanding of each position, I don't see it at all unless I modify as I have done above.

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Now I'm going to go shower, etc., won't reply for a while, probably won't reply until tomorrow, tbh. I think the position is settled, I can leave this though:



 

Dafunkdoc_Unlimited

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Now up your encyclopedia of oppression or
:sas1:.....there isn't just one.....


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:sas2:
 

Fillerguy

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Just because atheism is compatible with nihilism doesn't mean one is the natural progression into the other. The belief in the lack of meaning/value is an entirely different line of thinking than the lack of a belief in a god(s).... One is more of a personal, paradoxical assumption, that focuses on immaterial concepts like law/love/hate/knowledge while the other makes an assumption about divine or supernatural beings.

Positive nihilism exists, Absurdism, which encourages one create their own mean in the universe. That can easily lead into agnosticism.

Atheists can range from irreligious ppl to soft atheists, those who do not believe in deities but do not out right reject them....like not liking ass eating despite never actually trying it before.
 

Ohene

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theism could just as easily negate purpose...especially if you believe what some say about "God being in control", "destiny", "God having a plan" etc.
that rhetoric essentially makes it seem like were just puppets
 

Anton

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theism could just as easily negate purpose...especially if you believe what some say about "God being in control", "destiny", "God having a plan" etc.
that rhetoric essentially makes it seem like were just puppets
 

Anton

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Just because atheism is compatible with nihilism doesn't mean one is the natural progression into the other. The belief in the lack of meaning/value is an entirely different line of thinking than the lack of a belief in a god(s).... One is more of a personal, paradoxical assumption, that focuses on immaterial concepts like law/love/hate/knowledge while the other makes an assumption about divine or supernatural beings.

Positive nihilism exists, Absurdism, which encourages one create their own mean in the universe. That can easily lead into agnosticism.

Atheists can range from irreligious ppl to soft atheists, those who do not believe in deities but do not out right reject them....like not liking ass eating despite never actually trying it before.


Positive nihilism is a coping mechanism, same for Absurdism. Camus was the master of juelzing.
 

Ganso Bomb

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So for any atheists, do any of you believe life has an objective, inherent purpose or meaning outside of Survival & Reproduction? If not, you're a nihilist.
When I was agnostic/atheist, I naturally came to this conclusion. And contrary to what most people would think, it felt more freeing than depressing at the time. The idea that my purpose/meaning was entirely defined by me and I could live my live however I wanted and the consequences ultimately wouldn't matter.
 

Anton

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So for any atheists, do any of you believe life has an objective, inherent purpose or meaning outside of Survival & Reproduction? If not, you're a nihilist.
When I was agnostic/atheist, I naturally came to this conclusion. And contrary to what most people would think, it felt more freeing than depressing at the time. The idea that my purpose/meaning was entirely defined by me and I could live my live however I wanted and the consequences ultimately wouldn't matter.

what are you now?
 

Uitomy

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Christianity and Judaism don’t even go far back enough in history to cover the immense amount of wars and battles that went on in the world. I mean shyt, the holocaust wasn’t caused in the name of God and even the slave trade, that shyt was done in the name of MONEY and no matter how many times they used God to justify it, the reality of what they were doing means they’ll go to the same hell fhey “allegedly” believed so they were incapable of even believing in God in the first place.

Think about most major international conflicts going on now, you don’t hear a peep about religion being the biggest issue. It’s usually about groups wanting power or general chaos, they don’t believe in anything but darkness
 
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