Culture with atheism as center?

T'ai Chi

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Does anyone know of any culture, anywhere, from any time period, that had atheism as its center?

I see a lot, all as far as I can see, of cultures with some type of religion as their center.
 
What's even more interesting is that atheistic ideas develop in almost every culture and time period. It seems doubting the particular mythos your circumstances dictate you should believe is not limited by racial or cultural lines.
 
Here's the key: Before the priests (religion) - there was Myth. Religion is Myth gone mad. And Myth doesn't require Atheism.
 
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Since Atheism is simply the nonacceptance of a particular element of some religions, I wouldn't expect it to be the center of a culture.

Instead you might ask if Humanism, for example, could be the anchor of a particular culture. Or the mostly secular content of Confucianism.

In some parts of the world, we have cultures without Theism as their core evolving right in front of our eyes.

Or have we strayed from the path by no longer having Animism, Shamanism, or Agricultural Polytheism as our cultural mythologies?

I think you have point that we Humans seek to build our communal lives around ideals that affirm life and consciousness as being fundamentally significant. But the Theism that you personally expouse isn't the only way we have expressed this.

We have quite an number of peoplle here at the JREF that live significant and meaningfull lives without Theism. Their stories vary and are of their own writing.

I'm thankful to be in a culture that encourages my own spiritual journey rather than holding me to dead forms.
 
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When it comes to manipulating the beliefs of a people for its own self-serving ends, atheism has proved to be a very poor player. Oh, its always there. Quite often the most brilliant members of a religious society reject that religion, but they are generally small in number. As a way of keeping large numbers of people in line, an open and honest appraisal of how things work, skepticism, including skepticism about God is not up to the task. Pity, but hey, that's humans for ya.
 
Are there aphilatelist clubs?

/that's as far as I'll go in feeding scandinavian folkloric creatures...
 
T'ai Chi said:
I see a lot, all as far as I can see, of cultures with some type of religion as their center.
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Which religion is the center of current Canadian culture?
Which religion is the center of current Japanese culture?
Which religion is the center of current Lebanese culture?

I could go on.
 
Communism is usually bundled with atheism in the same package. Two doctrines for the price of one.

Communist USSR was an atheist state, even if it did not completely destroy its Orthodox church.

Communist China is another atheist state, which keeps religion in its control, without banning it altogether (which would be quite impossible).

Then there is the Vatican State, of course. Officially it is a Christian place, but I would eat my hat if more than 10% of its population sincerely in their hearts believe in any deity whatsoever. Circus and bluff, say I.
 
Yet another from the Vaults of Creationist Fallacies.

"Culture => religion".

"Religion => culture".

It follows that what is not religion is detrimental to culture.

Ergo:

"Atheism => no culture".

The next logical step is, of course, to get rid of those culture-destroying atheists...
 
Who cares?

What is important about this question, T'ai?

Just a couple points: religion isn't at the center of all cultures that I know of. And, the point has been made above - it's certainly not any one particular religion at the center of all individual cultures. (each culture doesn't necessarily have a specific religion at it's center).
There are plenty of things that cultures can center around beside religious issues. Atheism seems like a stupid choise, however.

YOu can't center a culture around the non-belief in god(s). I don't see why we'd want to.
 
T'ai Chi said:
Does anyone know of any culture, anywhere, from any time period, that had atheism as its center?

I see a lot, all as far as I can see, of cultures with some type of religion as their center.
Click to expand...

And can you show us the benefits of that T'ai, it seems that there is a lot of war and oppression that goes along with the religous core.
 
Roboramma said:
Who cares?

What is important about this question, T'ai?
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Well, I can't say that I take your 'response' seriously.

What is important about discussion religion and non-religion in a forum on Religion? Are you for real? :)

T'ai Chi - Rule 12 (Public forum rules) in the newly formatted membership agreement reads as follows:

MA said:
“Attack the argument, not the arguer." Having your opinion, claim or argument challenged, doubted or dismissed is not attacking the arguer.
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While your response is certainly mild, it is also nothing more than an attack on the arguer; in this case, Roboramma. Please remain on-topic and be mindful of Rule 12.

Thank you.

(ETA: this was reported today, and I didn't realize it predated the new rules going in force. I'm going to leave it here rather than remove it and create more confusion; my apologies for not realizing that this was being grandfathered. My fault entirely - sorry, T'ai Chi.)
Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: jmercer
 
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Originally Posted by In My Spare Time
Which religion is the center of current Canadian culture?
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hgc said:
Roman Catholic
Church of England
Some home-grown Protestant sect?

<SNIP>
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Not sure whether you are serious in your response or not.

But the answer is "None of the above". There is no religion at the centre of Canadian culture. An illustration of this was the huge (over 100,000 people) gathering on Parliment Hill in Ottawa in support of the USA and its people held a couple of days after 9/11 (sic). No religious "leaders" spoke and God was not mentioned.
 
In the book "Cultural Contingencies", Tony Nevin has a chapter investigating "The Formation and Survival of Experimental Communities"; in this chapter, one of the variables involved is whether the community was founded on religious principles or not. (Note, "not being founded on religious principles" is not the same as "being founded on atheism"; the former makes sense, whereas the latter is what TC is asking for.)

As one example of a community (is it a "culture"? depends on one's definition--I will bet it does not satisfy TC, but they explicitly call themselves an experimental culture) that was not founded on religious principles, there is Los Horcones, a Walden 2 community. Their stance on religion?
At Los Horcones individual beliefs are allowed and respected, so long as they do not interfere with the objectives of this community, which are; cooperation, sharing, non-violence and equality.* Members can practice their own religion and the community respects this.
*Many religions agree with these objectives.

Los Horcones is not a religious community since there is no particular religion to which all members must subscribe, neither are we anti-religious. We encourage members to practice their religious principles in their daily life, instead of just talking about them.
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JJM 777 said:
Communism is usually bundled with atheism in the same package. Two doctrines for the price of one.

Communist USSR was an atheist state, even if it did not completely destroy its Orthodox church.
Click to expand...

It did, however, largely swap God for The State as a rallying point for the ignroant to follow the power hungry and empower them with an all-encompassing authority over people's livelihood.

The parallels are not coincidental.
 
My whole cultural life revolves around NOT frying monkey brains.

Any other thing I don't do that my whole life revolves around that you're interested in?
 
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