I'm curious why atheists try to "convert" believers. Some atheists make a living at it; Dawkins and Hitchens are two examples. Some atheists attempt to convert believers by trying to make us feel stupid, irrational, and delusional. Why? These tactics seem inconsistent with the fundamentals of atheism. Let me explain:
Atheism is the worldview that there is no god. There is a negative manifestation: denial of the existence of god; and there is a positive manifestation: belief that there are only laws of nature, matter, science. In most cases, atheists think they are following what is simply truth: that no god exists is as true and intuitive as 2 + 2 = 4. By definition, there is no moral value in espousing atheism. Atheism does not guide the conscience; it does not prescribe an ethical code; it does not promote justice. If true, atheism just is.
We can easily contrast this with religion. The major religions come with a moral code. That is, God's existence entails consequences for humanity. In some cases, eternal consequences. God might have something to say about ethics, justice, family, and all the rest. And most religions are mutually exclusive: there is only one God, and He has the knowledge and authority to dictate His will to us. Further, believers acknowledge the faith element to religion. That is, believers understand that our worldview involves...well...belief. It follows that believers would want to convert as many people as we can: literally everything is at stake. Yet, believers rarely approach evangelism by attacking atheists. Surely many believers think atheism is foolish, and some make a living debating and fighting atheism. But this is usually a defensive move. Religion has to defend itself against the attacks of atheism. Which gets us back to my concern: atheism has no business attacking in the first place. Atheism is just not the kind of thing one should concern himself with spreading. Or is it?
Atheists will say that religion is dangerous: violence, oppression, tyranny, all in the name of God. We've heard it all before. The problem is that the same tragedies and injustices occur in the name of democracy, justice, productivity, and much more. Yet, no one goes around (at least no one we'd take seriously) saying that we should abolish all governments and business.
Atheists might say that religion is unhealthy to the believer: it's delusion, fantasy, like wishing on a star. We'd be better off if we'd follow the more enlightened of the world. The problem here is that there's no evidence that faith hurts anyone. There is, however, much evidence to the contrary. Believers tend to be more generous, hopeful, and happy. The only ones who seem to be bothered by faith are atheists. But they should feel no more threatened by believers than by a child who believes in the Tooth Fairy or the Boogeyman.
Perhaps what is really going on is that atheism requires just as much faith as does religion. Some might say it requires more faith to believe that life evolved by chance out of lifeless particles in space (never mind the bigger question: where did the particles--and the space for that matter--come from?). Perhaps atheism is the ultimate arrogance, believing that there can be no higher intelligence than our own. Perhaps atheists are searching, as everyone does at some point, to make sense out of the world, and it bothers them that believers have such a simple answer.
Any thoughts??
