Humanism

One of the most potent things about losing one’s religion is that we often feel a big gap left in our lives because our religion informed much of our life’s direction and purpose.  It’s very common for religious people to question how someone can live without religion, because they were raised in an environment which put religious belief at the center of existence.  The thought is that, if one loses their religion, then certainly they must also be losing their very purpose in life.  It’s a common reasoning behind why religious people often dismiss Atheists as misguided, confused, or just going through a phase.

We’re often born into circumstances where our entire community is of a particular religious affiliation, and through extreme peer pressure and social immersion, the community instills the idea in its people, and especially youth, that this is the only way of thinking.  Obviously, that is very far from truth, but isolation within a social structure that advocates only a single cultural viewpoint doesn’t leave much room for people to explore their own path.

But if someone takes the path of being Atheist, there’s usually a certain set of conditions that informed that choice.  Skepticism is often at the core of it.  If someone is highly skeptical, it’s because they care about proof or evidence before believing something.  If no religious claim can stand up to scrutiny, then the focus on how we should live our lives naturally shifts from caring mostly about what some deity might think, to caring about the lives of our fellow humans as the single-most important driver in our thought process.  This is called Humanism.

But there are many different kinds of Humanism, so it’s important to note which kind.  Most Atheists will say they are Secular Humanists.  According to americanhumanist.org (2015), “Secular Humanism is an outgrowth of eighteenth century enlightenment rationalism and nineteeth century freethought” (para. 8).  The primary focus is on people, and a rejection of all religious claims of supernatural belief.  Secular Humanism offers an ethical system to follow.  Atheism is nothing more than the rejection of the claim of a god or gods, and so it’s not a system of ethics in itself. 

There are many resources on the web to learn about Humanism.  It’s important to note that Humanism is NOT a religion.  It’s a system of ethical guidance that puts humans first.  As a Humanist, one would take the position that we should make the world into a place where people come first.

For a closer look into Humanism, you can search Google and find many different resources.  I recommend taking a look at:

https://www.secularhumanism.org

What's my label?

Humans have thrived because of knowledge.  Psychologically, the unknown can become a representative for instability, danger, and therefore fear.  It's no surprise that early humans came up with absurd stories in an effort to understand their environment and desperately sought to effect some control over it.  Keep in mind that these people didn't know why it rained, what the sun was, or what caused a bolt of lightning and clap of thunder.  Common everyday things we don't even think about were extremely mysterious to them.  Our ancestors were perpetually fearful, and therefore superstitious and made up stories to try to explain these natural things/events in their environment they didn't understand.  They didn't know what the sun was, so it became a God to many.  They didn't understand the ocean, so they thought it was the domain of a God.  Every single aspect of nature was tied directly to some kind of esoteric or supernatural explanation.  But the explanation wasn't enough.

If it rained enough for crops to prosper, God was pleased.  If it rained too much and flooded, it was God's anger.  The attempt to attribute natural experiences of life to constructs that people could reason and understand was the forefather to the now ubiquitous use of labels.  We label everything, because it lets us know where it fits in our worldview and how to react to it.  People themselves can have so many labels, Chevy lover, 49'ers fan, vegetarian, heavy metal lover, father, mother, white, black, short, tall, thin, fat, cute, ugly, young, old, and the list of labels could go on for many, many pages.  It's bidirectional, in that there are labels that people place on us, and labels that we decide for ourselves.  Unfortunately, there's a lot of confusion around labels of belief.  Maybe you're reading this and you're not sure if you qualify as an Atheist or something else.  What others think of us based on the labels they place on us can often be important to us, but it can be even more important for us to know our own labels that describe us accurately.  We need to know who we are and where we stand.

I'll take a shallow run-through of the primary labels that are the most common.  There are many, certainly, but generally speaking, we can narrow most down to six.  Four of these, the primary ones that I'll explain, have two parts to them.  What you believe, and what you claim to know.  Many people often refer to "agnostic" but this by itself means nothing.  I have no doubt you've heard plenty of "agnostic" jokes making light of the agnostic stance in order to belittle people.  After this, you should understand why such jokes are ridiculous.

Obviously, we know what Theist and Atheist are.  The "A" simply means "not".  In the same way that asymmetric means "not symmetric".  Obviously, Theist is someone who believes in the existence of a god or gods.  Atheist simply means, "not Theist".  It doesn't mean anything more than that.  People often attempt to attach extra labels to Atheist, and most of them are absurd such as "deviant" and "anarchist".  Atheism itself is nothing more than the rejection of the positive assertion that a god or gods exist.  That's all there is to it.  But what you will also have likely heard often are people who say they are "agnostic".  Agnosticism, like Atheism, is nothing more than a rejection of the positive assertion of knowledge (or gnosticsm).  Saying one is "agnostic" is as useless as saying one is "gnostic".  It means absolutely nothing by itself.  It must be paired with the appropriate term to have any purpose or meaning as a label.

So, Theist or Atheist is what you believe, and Gnostic or Agnostic is what you claim to know.  This means we have 4 possible variants in a spectrum.

• Gnostic Theist - Believes in God(s) and claims to KNOW it undoubtedly.
• Agnostic Theist - Believes in God(s) but does NOT claim to KNOW for sure.
• Agnostic Atheist - Does not believe in God(s) but does NOT claim to KNOW for sure.
• Gnostic Atheist - Does not believe in God(s) and claims to KNOW it undoubtedly.

I find that most of the time when someone claims to be "agnostic" what they are really saying is that they aren't sure what they believe, or that they haven't found a belief system yet that matches what they think they believe.  There are a few other positions, but they are more rare, and I'll also explain an often misunderstood contrast:

• Anti-Theist - An Atheist who is strongly opposed to theism and wants it wiped out.
• Anti-Atheism - A Theist who is strongly opposed to atheism and wants it wiped out.

Often misunderstood is the difference between an Unbeliever and Nonbeliever:

• Unbeliever - A Theist who does not worship the same god(s) as another Theist.
• Nonbeliever - Synonym for Atheist.

Atheism is much more simple for labels, because it really doesn't have any sublabels.  Theism can have several sublabels, which includes not only the primary religion, but the denomination, and sometimes, that denomination is broken into subgroups.  Thankfully, for Atheists, it's really just a matter of gnostic or agnostic, and the vast majority that I've ever interacted with are agnostic, and this is what you're likely to hear them say:

"Sure, we don't know 100% for sure that there's no God or Gods, but that's only because you can't disprove a negative and absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.  Regardless, I'm 99.999% sure, which is good enough for me."

That's typically because Atheists care about what can be proven, and one of the reasons they are Atheist is because pretty much nothing in the Bible, or any other religion's holy book for that matter, can be proven.  The mindset is one of caring about proof and evidence that is reasonable according to the scientific method, meaning it's observable, testable, and the outcome is predictable and repeatable.  By contrast, in the 25+ years I spent as a Christian, I've very rarely ever come across an agnostic Theist.  Typically, you'll hear something similar to:

"God is 100% real.  He exists, and His proof is everywhere.  I know for a FACT that God is real, because (insert anecdotal evidence / circular logic here)."

So, generally, people most likely fall within the categories of - Gnostic Theist, and Agnostic Atheist.  The other two are much less common, and that's because Atheists typically are able to admit they can't know an unknown, and Theists typically are too scared to publicly admit their doubts in a religious world that frowns on such things.

I hope that helps you to understand the common labels and their PROPER use.  Some Atheists often choose another label completely to tell other people, and that's "Humanist", but I'll save the blog about that for next week.  Also, don't feel too pressured by labels as an Atheist.  If you're not comfortable talking about it, you can always just say, "That's none of your business", or "That's very personal and I'd rather not talk about it."