Recently I came across a Twitter thread that perpetuated the notion that atheism is a belief. Which is always frustrating to read because atheism is not and has never been a belief; it’s an absence of belief.
There are many historical definitions of atheism which show the prejudices of the religious towards the “godless”, but the best modern definition of the word comes from philosophy: “rejection of belief in God or gods”. But it would perhaps be better put as not believing in the existence of gods because there is no satisfactory evidence for their existence.
Note the word “satisfactory” in there – no, just because you had blue cheese last night and dreamed of Jesus, this isn’t evidence for the existence of any god. And no the bible isn’t evidence either – you may believe that it was written by your god, but there is no evidence that it is the case.
Does this matter? Not that much to be honest, it is just that as a whole atheists tend to be a little bit pedantic about their “beliefs” or lack of them.
