The Psychology of Atheism

On the psychological causes of atheism as well as the differences amongst the revolutionary, frustrated and intellectual atheist...

The psychology of atheism brings inside the large and not possible question of what's God ahead of we can move on to the question of belief and disbelief in God, so it really is difficult. Atheism as we all know is actually a disbelief in or denial of God or gods or perhaps a position that God does not or can not exist. Theism or belief in God is based on the notion of a larger energy thinking of the truth that the universe seems to become greater than us and appears to recommend the role of a supernatural / higher getting who controls it. God is thought of the very first bring about who designed almost everything else and employing the design argument of philosophy, God could be the ultimate designer with the universe. The belief in God is one of the oldest beliefs of humanity and not surprisingly led to the improvement of more organized belief systems like religion.

Atheism or absence of belief in God has a variety of forms as materialism and communism as also rationalism, objectivism, positivism and science. The history of materialism goes back to the Carvaka college of Hinduism in the 6th century BCE and also to Democritus, the Greek philosopher who proposed atomism. Even Buddhism with no emphasis on private God, is according to a lot of an atheistic religion. Hence some kind of atheism already started with materialistic philosophies and with Socrates, doubting the existence of anything and asking inquiries as with skepticism became an extremely well-liked philosophical position and actually led to the intellectual want for better definitions of God and the human situation. On the other hand with all the rise of Christianity along with other Abrahamic religions, acceptance of God was well known all through the Middle ages and even through the Renaissance when art and literature depended heavily on religious concepts and ideas. The sudden change in people's beliefs needless to say came using the rise of science, socialism, logical positivism and with influential thinkers like Freud, Marx, Nietzsche, Russell, Darwin and others.

The philosophy of atheism is varied and logical positivism on which science is primarily based considered that due to the fact no experiment could prove or disprove God, there can under no circumstances be any proof to recommend that God exists. Marx certainly provided a sociological explanation suggesting that religion is some sort of social construct, an institution that served as the 'opium for the people' and only assists the upper classes to manage and oppress the functioning class. Nietzsche who largely influenced Freud considered religion as man's wish fulfillment and God as designed by man as part of this wish fulfillment. The theory of evolution by Darwin which suggests that the universe is quite a few billions of years old and that genetic variation and selection have led to improvement of species was also totally incompatible with Christianity and all other types of religion that heavily is determined by the idea of a personal God and creationism or the theory that God made the universe inside a precise time period. All these things together led to an 'atheistic revolution' within the early part of the 20th century.

With atheism it is actually necessary to understand what can lead to such beliefs that God does not exist. You'll find sociological explanations like people from certain regions and nations, say for instance communist countries who don't possess a religion are naturally atheists as they don't atheists stick to organized religion and don't believe in God. As a result the question asked might be whether or not belief of God is inherent inside a person or irrespective of whether belief of God is constructed by society. Can men and women born in an atheist household nonetheless somehow possess a individual belief in God? Of course they are able to and that may be how the psychology of atheism is somehow more explanatorily plausible than a sociological explanation of atheism which can define the phenomena of atheism in society but not atheism in a person.

The psychology of atheism therefore delivers an individualistic explanation of atheism and though specific individual psychological reactions, feelings, or behavior could possibly be generalized, some other individuals are largely individual or particular. Carl Jung clearly used this kind of categorization to distinguish a collective and personal unconscious area of the thoughts. Jung and Freud were nevertheless entirely unique in their understanding of religion. Whereas Freud largely believed that religion was primarily based on oedipal and libidinal wishes and is usually a direct outcome of human want for protection and security, Jung emphasized much more on self actualization inside the kind of 'individuation' in addition to a spiritual goal in life.