There seems to be a bit of confusion over the term atheist. Some people think atheism only arose in response to Christianity. They say there can't be a position opposing a thing until that thing exists.
Part of this misunderstanding is caused by a failure to understand what atheism is and is not.
Atheism is not a belief system in opposition to religion. Atheism is simply the lack of any belief in gods. Atheism is the way all people would view reality if religious belief was removed from the picture. Everyone's an atheist until they adopt theistic beliefs.
Here's an entry from Wikipedia outlining the origin of the word atheist;
In early Ancient Greek, the adjective atheos (ἄθεος, from the privative ἀ- + θεός "god") meant "godless". The word acquired an additional meaning in the 5th century BCE, severing relations with the gods; that is, "denying the gods, ungodly", with more active connotations than asebēs, or "impious". Modern translations of classical texts sometimes translate atheos as "atheistic". As an abstract noun, there was also atheotēs (ἀθεότης), "atheism". Cicero transliterated the Greek word into the Latin atheos. The term found frequent use in the debate between early Christians and pagans, with each side attributing it, in the pejorative sense, to the other.[10]In English, the term atheism was derived from the French athéisme in about 1587.[11] The term atheist (from Fr. athée), in the sense of "one who denies or disbelieves the existence of God",[12] predates atheism in English, being first attested in about 1571.[13] Atheist as a label of practical godlessness was used at least as early as 1577.[14] The words deist and theist entered English after atheism, being first attested in 1621[15] and 1662,[16] respectively, and followed by theism and deism in 1678[17] and 1682,[18] respectively. Deism and theism changed meanings slightly around 1700, due to the influence of atheism; deism was originally used as a synonym for today's theism, but came to denote a separate philosophical doctrine.[19]
Karen Armstrong writes that "During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the word 'atheist' was still reserved exclusively for polemic.... The term 'atheist' was an insult. Nobody would have dreamed of calling himself an atheist."[20] Atheism was first used to describe a self-avowed belief in late 18th-century Europe, specifically denoting disbelief in the monotheistic Judeo-Christian God.[21] In the 20th century, globalization contributed to the expansion of the term to refer to disbelief in all deities, though it remains common in Western society to describe atheism as simply "disbelief in God".[22] Most recently, there has been a push in certain philosophical circles to redefine atheism negatively, as the "absence of belief in deities", rather than as a belief in its own right; this definition has become popular in atheist communities, though its mainstream usage has been limited.[22][23][24]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atheism
