Agnosticism, Humanism and Atheism

1375 Words6 Pages
Discuss how agnosticism, atheism and humanism determine the aspirations and behaviour of individuals The primary secular world views are Atheism, Agnosticism and Humanism, each of which influences an individual’s behaviour and aspirations. The ambiguous and self interpretative definitions of each of these non religious worldviews leads to interchangeable use of each term and confusion to which group has which beliefs (or disbeliefs). Despite differences, each of these worldviews share the absence of a belief in a transcendent entity or being giving reasons against such an existence such as the lack of evidence. Atheism is a non religious worldview in which a follower strongly asserts the non existence of a deity or that it is impossible to be certain of such an existence. Atheism is often mistaken for the lack of belief in God, yet this could encompass certain Humanists, Agnostics or even children that have not yet been faced with the idea of God. Atheism is a post enlightenment European movement that flourished with the cult of individualism of the new era. It has no sacred text, revelation or set belief system and so it is impossible to group Atheists into a unified group. The only shared factor between Atheists is the disbelief in a God. Being an Atheist will influence an individual’s aspirations and behaviour, and will do so independently from individual to individual, generally however, Atheism will influence similarly. Aspirations can typically be divided into two groups: those towards oneself and those to the world. An Atheist may aspire to live happily and using the measure of conscience and reason as their guidance, see that this requires a just and fair world. In this manner an atheist may aspire to create a world that is just and fair and so aspire to become more environmentally friendly, be a nicer person etc. Disbelief in a God would
Open Document