April Pedersen

Atheist. The word has shock value, but simply means 'without belief in God.' Unlike agnostics, who suggest that God s unknowable, and that they cannot or do not know whether God exists, atheists discount any and all supernatural entities. Atheists are not waiting for evidence of God any more than they are waiting for evidence of purple unicorns.

It is no coincidence that humans are the only species who practice religion, for we are also the only species that is aware of death. Soon after evolving the ability to think (and to think about death), we began to believe in gods: sun gods, fertility gods, volcano gods, animal gods, and the god of special interest to atheists, the monotheistic Judeo-Christian, omnipotent, universe-creating God of the Bible. God belief seems to be an inevitable cultural byproduct of self-awareness.