Scott Adams on Irrational Atheists

One of the blogs I like to read is The Dilbert Blog by Scott Adams. Scott is the author of the Dilbert Cartoon, a favourite with most geeks. What many don't realise is that his quirky sense of humour also comes out in his writing. So often his unusual mind is able to see right through the fog and put a subject into refreshing perspective. He reminds me a lot of Michael Leunig, whose free calendar from The Age keeps my head straight every day.

Anyhow, in the light of my earlier post I just had to share Scott's take on the Irrationality of Atheism:

Allow me to summarize every discussion of atheism that has ever occurred on the Internet:

Atheist: “Religion is irrational.”

Believer: “Oh yeah?

Atheism is a religion too, because it’s a cause that’s believed on faith! See Merriam-Webster’s 4th definition of religion.”

Atheist: “Atheism is religion the same way that NOT collecting stamps is a hobby.”

Believer: “You can’t prove the non-existence of God. And belief without proof is faith. Check Merriam-Webster’s second definition of faith. Therefore, atheists are irrational by definition.”

Atheist: “You can NEVER (or almost never) prove a negative.
Besides, some things are so obvious that proof is unnecessary. Do you believe there’s a monster under your bed? You have no proof that it doesn’t exist. Therefore, by your reasoning, it’s only reasonable to believe there MIGHT be a monster under your bed.”

Believer: "Hey, you never know."

And so it is argued by both believers and agnostics that atheists must be either irrational – believing the non-existence of God without proof for that position – or atheists are really just fence-sitting agnostics and don't admit it.

My question is this: If you reckon that the existence of God has less than a 1 in a trillion chance of being true, based on all the available evidence, but not proof, can you call yourself an atheist? And if so, would you still be irrational?

Check out the original article, the comments are becoming interesting!