Atheism (from Greek átheos, from a-, “without,” and theós, “god”) — The position that denies the existence of God or gods, or simply does not admit them. In antiquity átheos was above all an accusation: Socrates was charged with not recognizing the gods of the city (Plato, Apology), and Anaxagoras and Diagoras of Melos were prosecuted or persecuted on religious grounds. Positive (or strong) atheism, which asserts that God does not exist, is distinguished from negative (or weak) atheism, which merely lacks belief in God without asserting his nonexistence; the latter differs from agnosticism, which concerns knowledge rather than belief. Explicit, systematic atheism becomes possible in modernity: Baron d’Holbach sets out an atheist materialism in the System of Nature (1770), and Feuerbach, in The Essence of Christianity (1841), interprets God as a projection of the human essence. Marx makes the critique of religion the premise of social critique, Nietzsche announces in The Gay Science (1882, § 125) the “death of God” as a cultural event whose nihilistic consequences were still to come, and Freud, in The Future of an Illusion (1927), treats religion as an illusion born of helplessness. In existentialism, Sartre holds that without God existence precedes essence (see essence and existence). Theists respond with arguments for God’s existence and point to the moral and metaphysical foundations of belief; analytic philosophers such as J. L. Mackie (The Miracle of Theism, 1982) discuss arguments for atheism, notably the problem of evil. See Feuerbach, Nietzsche, Freud, Sartre, theism, and nihilism.
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