Why are atheists so scientifically illiterate?

I haven't seen one good defense for atheism that doesn't revolve around stupid arguments about how lack of evidence is supposed to disprove hypotheses, nonsense about unicorns and werewolves, idiotic remarks like "you can't prove a negative" and "the burden of proof is on you" and other rot that displays a blatant misunderstanding and ignorance of the scientific method.