Random thought on atheism and religion
There seems to be fairly frequent discussion among critics of atheism on whether it's actually a religion or not. Some people think it is, because it's based just as much on unprovable premises as any other religion. Some people think it's not, because it's actually the negation of religion. It's kind of a silly question, since it's founded in people's generally arbitrary standards of what counts as a "real" religion and what doesn't; and I kind of wonder if framing the definition of atheism in those terms conflates some concepts that are better differentiated.
The way I'd personally define "religion" would be something like "The specific set of symbols, myths, and rituals that a person finds meaningful as a way of conceptualizing spirituality." And that's a definition that omits atheism, because atheism doesn't actually have its own set of symbols, myths, or rituals.
And I think, incidentally, that this is a big part of why the messages that atheists put up in public spaces to counter the Christian messages tend to be so negatively perceived. Due to the lack of a specific vocabulary of symbols, it's hard to express a message that is simultaneously positive and explicitly atheist. "God bless you" is a basically positive message; you can modify it into "Goddess bless you," "Buddha bless you," "Elua bless you," "Elvis bless you" or whatever and still make it a positive message that is an authentic representation of a specific religious tradition. But you can't really express that from an atheist perspective. You either end up just saying "Bless you" (which can easily be taken for a generic theistic message), or something like "There is no god. Bless you" (which dilutes the benevolence of the message with a blatantly confrontational statement).
So I really don't think that it makes sense to think of atheism as a religion in the sense that Christianity or Wicca or Raelianism is. A more meaningful consideration is atheism versus theism. Neither of which is really a religion; they're more like philosophies, or meta-religions, or some such. With reference to my earlier definition of religion, that framing of atheism allows you to define it as "The philosophy that the referents of religious concepts exist strictly within human psychology"; and to define theism as the direct opposite of that: "The philosophy that religious concepts refer to entities that exist literally and independently of the human mind."
And, when you view the question from that perspective, it becomes conceptually meaningful to consider yourself as a religious atheist-i.e., someone who finds meaning in a particular set of symbols without believing that those symbols literally exist. If, for example, you consider the myth of human salvation through the resurrection of Christ to be metaphorically meaningful to you, but don't believe it happened literally, you could describe yourself as a Christian atheist. That sounds pretty paradoxical given the way we generally think of religion, and I doubt there are very many people who actually hold such a perspective, but I do think there are a lot more Pagan atheists and Buddhist atheists out there.
I don't know if this kind of framing of religious discussion is particularly meaningful to anyone else, but it does seem to me like it clears up a lot of confusion about what exactly is meant when people talk about religion and atheism.
The way I'd personally define "religion" would be something like "The specific set of symbols, myths, and rituals that a person finds meaningful as a way of conceptualizing spirituality." And that's a definition that omits atheism, because atheism doesn't actually have its own set of symbols, myths, or rituals.
And I think, incidentally, that this is a big part of why the messages that atheists put up in public spaces to counter the Christian messages tend to be so negatively perceived. Due to the lack of a specific vocabulary of symbols, it's hard to express a message that is simultaneously positive and explicitly atheist. "God bless you" is a basically positive message; you can modify it into "Goddess bless you," "Buddha bless you," "Elua bless you," "Elvis bless you" or whatever and still make it a positive message that is an authentic representation of a specific religious tradition. But you can't really express that from an atheist perspective. You either end up just saying "Bless you" (which can easily be taken for a generic theistic message), or something like "There is no god. Bless you" (which dilutes the benevolence of the message with a blatantly confrontational statement).
So I really don't think that it makes sense to think of atheism as a religion in the sense that Christianity or Wicca or Raelianism is. A more meaningful consideration is atheism versus theism. Neither of which is really a religion; they're more like philosophies, or meta-religions, or some such. With reference to my earlier definition of religion, that framing of atheism allows you to define it as "The philosophy that the referents of religious concepts exist strictly within human psychology"; and to define theism as the direct opposite of that: "The philosophy that religious concepts refer to entities that exist literally and independently of the human mind."
And, when you view the question from that perspective, it becomes conceptually meaningful to consider yourself as a religious atheist-i.e., someone who finds meaning in a particular set of symbols without believing that those symbols literally exist. If, for example, you consider the myth of human salvation through the resurrection of Christ to be metaphorically meaningful to you, but don't believe it happened literally, you could describe yourself as a Christian atheist. That sounds pretty paradoxical given the way we generally think of religion, and I doubt there are very many people who actually hold such a perspective, but I do think there are a lot more Pagan atheists and Buddhist atheists out there.
I don't know if this kind of framing of religious discussion is particularly meaningful to anyone else, but it does seem to me like it clears up a lot of confusion about what exactly is meant when people talk about religion and atheism.