Every rational way you look at it, atheism[1] really is a crap idea. But first, let’s look at what it is.
Disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods.
Atheism, in its broadest sense, is a lack of belief in a deity or deities: the opposite of theism. This encompasses both people who assert that there are no gods and those who make no claim about whether gods exist or not. Narrower definitions of atheism typically regard as atheists only those people who assert the non-existence of gods…
These people may scoff at religion, such as how God can be in multiple places at the same time, yet they’re implicitly willing to accept quantum theory – which not only makes less sense but makes the claim that an object can be at two places at the same time. And this gets to the gist of why being an atheist is an act of lunacy: You shut out all possibility of there being gods without knowing either way, and thus without having a rational reason to. At least the rest of us have the sense to keep an open mind. Atheists are just as bad as the other religious nutters who insist that (only) their religion is right without bothering to see what else might be out there.
What is the point of being an atheist? From a philosophical point of view, being an atheist might aid trying to make an argument for or against being an atheist. This is similar to how “method actors” work. But any philosopher worth his salt would not need to do this. In fact, the best philosophers would be the opposite: the best method of structuring any worthy argument is from a neutral standpoint.
Even ignoring this, it only pays not to be an atheist. Those who call themselves atheists have the misfortune to belong to at least one of the following 3 unfortunate camps.
1. They don’t know what atheism is.
These people are either pitiful in only ever bothering to know or understand half of an idea, over-opinionated or gullible. One major reason for a person considering himself an atheist is to denounce religion. But it can easily be argued that atheism is also a religion (hence "the other religious nutters" referred to above). It at the very least has the main hallmark of religions, which is that believers have to take a leap of faith in order to taking as fact something that cannot be proven. Besides, there are many valid, good reasons for religion.
2. They’re merely saying it because it sounds cool (as with the historically-cool titles of “revolutionary” and “Marxist”).
Oh dear. (A future post is likely to focus on this.)
3. They really do believe that there are no gods.
But where’s their evidence? Once more, ignorance comes into play here. To say “there are so many bad things that happen, there mustn’t be a god” is not valid reasoning. You could say with equal validity, “there are so many good things that happen, there must be a god.” And a god is not necessarily a good creature, nor a bad one for that matter – some people consider Fate, Luck and Truth to be gods. Don’t laugh – they’re just as valid possibilities as any others, from a philosophical as well as a practical point of view.
Why would you want to believe that there are no gods? Implicit with the idea of a god is the idea of pursuing the good and moral life, bettering oneself, life after death and of reincarnation. All of these things lead to a healthier life regardless of whether gods really do exist; the belief of gods is merely a framework to help people to achieve worthwhile goals.
* * *
It only makes sense to keep an open mind, because let's face it, these are the stark possibilities:
There really are no gods. Oh well, you haven’t lost anything. In fact, you can still feel better about yourself than the atheists, because you realised beforehand that you were in no position to know either way prior to this (whatever ‘this’ is).
There are good gods. In this case, you will surely be praised by them at least for keeping an open mind.
There are bad gods. You can at least earn Browny points for pandering to the possibility of their existence, and hope for lesser torment. (But then, surely a bad god in a typical religious sense is purely evil, in which case the hope is in vain regardless of whether your actions are good or bad.)
There are good and bad gods. In this case, at least they both won’t all hate you for expelling the possibility of their very existence from your mind.
There are neutral gods. In this case, nothing lost, nothing gained.
None of us exists; the entire discussion is irrelevant. Oh well, once more there is nothing lost nor gained.
So I’ll leave you with this eye-opening statistic: Of the above possibilities, Atheists have at best a 50% chance of redemption (by either a god or oblivion) compared to those who are at the very least open-minded. You have been warned...
[1] With the notable exception of implicit atheists, assuming that they cannot be blamed for not being aware of theism.
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