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I also read the paper that claims that atheists do not exist and I disagree not only with the claim, but also with the reasoning.  It correctly states in the definitions that an atheist does not believe in a god.  But I disagree with the definition of agnostics.  An agnostic believes that it is literally impossible to know whether or not a god exists.  A gnostic, on the other hand, believes that it is possible to determine 100% whether or not a god exists.  

The point where the argument strays is where it is assumed that all atheists assert that there is not a god.  That is incorrect.  Atheism is exactly as it was defined, a lack of belief.  I am personally an Agnostic Atheist, which means that while I do not believe in a god, I don’t believe we can know for sure.  A person can also be an Agnostic Theist, which means that they believe in a god but don’t believe we can know for sure.

In the above post you admit that someone can have an atheistic belief and that it is based on belief and not science or logic.  I don’t agree, but let’s assume for a second that you are right.  What’s your point?  It doesn’t matter why someone is an atheist.  All that matters is that they are in fact an atheist and since you admit that someone can have an atheist belief, you are also admitting that they exist.  

The title of the paper is that atheists do not exist, but it only attempts to show why it is illogical to assert that a god does not exist.  These are two separate arguments.  The only argument against the existence of atheists is a very weak one that asserts that deep down inside, all atheists really believe in a god.  But the paper doesn’t even attempt that line of thought.

The reason that atheism is perfectly scientific and logical is the same reason that it is perfectly scientific and logical to not believe in unicorns, Santa Clause, Easter Bunny, vampires, gremlins, invisible giant purple dinosaurs, or any other supernatural being that it is absurd to believe in.  

Atheists believe that every claim ever made by any theist for evidence of the supernatural can be explained better by perfectly natural means.  Gods have been used throughout history to explain the things that humans don’t understand and as humans know more and more, gods have been used less and less.  Anyone that asserts that "God did it" really means that they can’t think of any explanation so it must have been God.  Well, that’s just lazy.

The paper attempts to make an analogy with gold being found in China.  The problem is that atheists and theists generally don’t disagree on what constitutes proof of the existence of gold.  They do, however, disagree on what is proof of a god.  A theist says they have had personal experience while an atheist says that the theist is mistaken and that the experience can be explained through perfectly natural psychological means.  Therefore, the analogy fails.  

Self-delusion, hallucination and outright lying are all explanations.  Most theists don’t disagree with these explanations because they easily use the same explanations to prove why other people’s religions are wrong.  The only difference is that they assume that it always happens to people in other religions and not theirs because theirs is genuine.  Any theist that is honest with himself/herself needs to admit the possibility that he/she could be wrong and that there could be a perfectly natural explanation for all of his/her experiences.  

The paper states that “To say there is no God requires absolute knowledge.”  The paper fails to recognize that to say that there definitely is a God also requires absolute knowledge.  That is why Agnosticism is the only truly rational position for either a theist or an atheist.      

The only logical argument for God in the paper is that the universe needs a designer.  There it is again.  I don’t know where the universe came from, how it could possibly exist without exterior influences, or why order appears in nature, so "God did it."  That is a very unscientific argument because it doesn’t even attempt to find a natural explanation.  

The paper concludes that the only two types of people are believers and agnostics.  This is wrong.  There are six kinds of people.  There are believers who claim to know, believers who claim to not know, and believers that claim that we can’t know.  There are non-believers that claim to know, non-believers that claim to not know, and non-believers that claim we can’t know.  

You can label any of these however you want, but the fact remains that some people don’t believe in a god and their reasons are based on scientific knowledge of the world around us and logical arguments meant to point out flaws in religious reasoning.  Just because theists don’t agree with atheists doesn’t make atheist arguments any less scientific or logical.  The same goes for theists.  The only thing that makes an argument not scientific or logical is if it doesn’t follow the methods and findings of science or if it doesn’t follow the rules of logic.

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