That seems like a reasonable answer to the original question. I think I said somewhere before in this thread, the origin of atheism would be hard to pin down because it was mostly, as you put it, kept in the closet because it was a punishable offense. I can see how the separation of church and state would allow belief systems to come out in the open.Pint wrote:I am getting off track, but the long and short answer to your question is Atheism has "come out of the closet" with the separation of church and state that most of the western world now enjoys. That was not present in ancient Greece, was not present in Europe until a couple hundred years ago
As for the Omar Khayyam guy, I've not heard of him before nor read his works, but if what you said is accurate, I'm not sure rejection of religion is the same as rejection of the idea of god(s). You could be deist for example, believing that a god exists but has not revealed itself to mankind and thus no religion is true.
Anyway, I had somewhat forgotten about this thread because it was more of a curiosity of mine than a big issue, but I thank you for your response. It's always nice to hear another perspective, whether I agree with it or not.
I didn't mean to say that the lack of a god removes "subjective purpose" from a person's life, but rather that it removes "objective meaning". Then again, in an atheist world there is little to nothing that is objective.Pint wrote:Religion might very well be the source of ones main purpose, but to say Atheism takes purpose out of an Atheist's life is untrue. The acceptable answer, as you put it, is that an individual can propose ones own purpose.
