Atheism and Theism are equally absurd.

Would you consider it absurd to deny the existence of Thor? How about Zeus? Poseidon, Hera, Minerva, Rah, or any of the millions of other Gods that I can not possibly cover here? Would you consider animism absurd? Your answer to most of these is probably yes. As it should be. Why? Because any form of theism is making a positive claim. And the onus lies with the claimant when asked to prove his claim. If he cannot, then the claim should be dismissed by a thinking person.

You're confusing two different things into the same thought. Yes, I would consider it absurd to deny the existance of Thor, Zues, Poseidon, etc. I would consider it equally absurd to claim that they exist. I think it is completely absurd for someone to claim that something exists when they have no proof that it exists. Just the same, I think it's equally absurd to claim that something doesn't exist when you cannot prove that it doesn't exist.

People are often confused by what atheism is. Atheism is not a positive claim, it is the rejection of a positive claim that is postulated by some, and inculcated to most of the rest. And as I said before, the burden of proof lies with the claimant, not the skeptic. I know I've posted this analogy before, but the theism scenario's absurdity is summarized by Bertrand Russel's teapot analogy:

I agree completely with Mr. Russel. I do not think it is absurd to doubt the existence of something which cannot be proven to exist. I do think it is absurd to claim it to be true that something does not exist based solely on the fact that it cannot be proven to exist. For instance, there is no way for us to prove that aliens exist or don't exist. I do not think it's absurd for someone to doubt aliens exist, because that's the logical path to take if there is no evidence for something. However, I do think it would be absurd for someone to claim that aliens do NOT exist, without evidence to back up their claim.

Now, if you still don't see why, I think this argument should be broken down mathematically. Theism essentially is an explanation for the existence of life, the cosmos, and everything inside it. But theism is only one of a billion different explanations that can be conjectured. In fact, it's one in an infinite, however I will stick with a billion for mathematical simplicity. One of these billion explanations must be correct. However, we can only lean towards one over the others when one has evidence, otherwise they should all have an equal weight in our consideration. Well, lets assume that this is the case. Lets assume that they all have equal weight (in reality they don't...science is evermore piling on the evidence, and ontological arguments make the God hypothesis unlikely to start with). Then what the theist is doing is claiming that his 1/1,000,000,000 is absolutely the correct one. The atheist is saying, no, it is one of the other 999,999,999/1,000,000,000.

I think you're over complicating the discussion, as I'm simply basing the idea that either a supreme being exists or doesn't exist. Two possibilities, only one can be right, and both have equal amounts of evidence(none.)

Just because there are two possible outcomes does not mean that they both deserve equal consideration. I could claim to be God himself. You have no real way of proving or disproving it. But if you gave it any serious consideration I would suggest that you get yourself admitted. That's how cults start. Just because two possible answers exist does not make both credible. And once again, the positive claim is the one that needs to be proved. If I claimed that I was God, it would be on me to prove it. It would not be on you to prove that I am not God, it is on me to prove it. Similarly, the God hypothesis demands evidence for any serious consideration.

What about the saying...

If there was no god, there would be no Athiests?

What about the saying... If there was no god, there would be no Athiests?

If there was no belief in God, there would be no atheists.

Thank you.

If there was no belief in God, there would be no atheists.

If there were no belief in god, everyone would be atheist by definition.

a·the·ist –noun
a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings.

I still say that to deny or disbelieve [verbs] implies action by an individual, which means it is not passive and thus not innate (as babies are not athiests). To deny it, the concept of God has to exist, which it wouldn't if there was no belief. Basically, 150,000 years ago there were no atheists.

If there were no belief in god, everyone would be atheist by definition.

Well, I agree, however the concept of atheist would not exist either. For instance, we are all a-alchemists. However, I do not believe that there exists a word that means people that do not believe in alchemy. So from that perspective nobody is a (whatever word may mean "one who does not believe in alchemy"). From our definition, yes, everyone would have been an atheist. However, from the perspective of a world with no concept of God, the term atheist would simply not exist.

I still say that to deny or disbelieve [verbs] implies action by an individual, which means it is not passive and thus not innate (as babies are not athiests). To deny it, the concept of God has to exist, which it wouldn't if there was no belief. Basically, 150,000 years ago there were no atheists.

To deny something you must actively reject the idea. Disbelief, however, is simply a lack of a belief. "A baby disbelieves" requires no more thought from the baby than "A baby exists," both sentences using action verbs.

I think most atheists would say that atheism is better defined as the lack of belief in a God or Gods. I would also like to point out that contrary to popular belief, atheism does not imply certainty of the nonexistence of God, but simply a lack of belief in God. It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking atheism requires some faith. If it were the 100% absolute rejection of the idea of God, I would agree (although I would say it only requires as much faith as the assumption that you will never see the statue of liberty as it exists today wave at you...technically possible). But that is not what atheism is.

Finally, Grav I agree that there were no atheists 150,000 years ago, but not for the reasons you do. By our definition (assuming that there were no primitive animist religions at the time), yes, everyone at the time was an atheist. However, since the concept of atheism did not exist 150,000 years ago, nobody would have been called an atheist.

This is just entirely a discussion of semantics, however. It is inherently circuitious and cannot come a pointed conclusion.