Atheists of the world...

It should come as no surprise to most of the people who read this blog (all two of you) that I'm an atheist.

I believe that naturalistic accounts explain the universe better than theological ones. I believe that most of the arguments put forward for the existence of Gods (and the supernatural in general) are flawed and unconvincing. And I believe that a belief should stand or fall on the amount of cogent evidence that supports it. Assertion and intuition rarely convince anyone.

However, I'm not sure that the attempts to create organisations around atheism are that desirable. The term simply denotes a lack of theistic beliefs – within that category you get naturalism, scientism, humanism, agnosticism, objectivism, nihilism, etc. all of which look at the universe in quite different ways.

Stand me next to another atheist and – beyond the absence of religious beliefs – there's no guarantee that we'll have any values or outlooks in common. In fact, I find some atheists misguided, even repugnant in some of their views.

Just as I believe that religious moderates need to organise against the extremists in their midsts, non-theists need to promote the values at the heart of their worldview – my agnosticism, humanism, naturalism and rationalism define who I am far more than my views on the supernatural. Indeed, there are even theists who are closer to my views than some atheists. Which is why I don't display the attempts at an atheist symbol (no matter how snazzy they might look). Atheism isn't a value – it's an absence. Rather than defining ourselves by what we're against, we need to define ourselves by what we're for.