Is atheism compatible with Buddhism?

[rug]

29. I think physics would govern that, not karma.

I can't answer what Buddhism is all about (nor do I think would Buddha), but forgiveness, tolerance, detachment and compassion have to be right up there.

Is it a philosophy, a religion, a state of being? Got me.

But what has gotten my attention is injecting a notion of atheism into it. While there is surely no personal god being in it, or a defined deity, and it therefore meets the minimal technical definition of atheism, still, the moving force in it, the moving towards Nirvana governed, apparently, by karma through reincarnation, has no scientific or material basis that I can see. If anything, it would be the result of some overwhelming transcendence, which in turn nudges against the concept of some kind of non-material, if not "spiritual", reality.

Even conceding that atheism is mute on science and that it simply holds no belief in a divinity, I don't see how the two can be reconciled.