# Why do so many people still believe in God?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [April 17, 2022, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965 "2022-04-17T20:24:15Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 35
### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2024, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/681 "2024-02-09T20:56:19Z")
Sometimes the talking leads to the killing.
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### Author:  [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2024, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/682 "2024-02-09T20:56:20Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#):
>
> > [@Pleonast](#):
> >
> > At least we’re discussing and not killing each other.
>
> Excluded middle.
I was unclear. I didn’t intend to imply a dichotomy, but the end points of a spectrum.
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2024, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/683 "2024-02-09T22:15:25Z")
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The scientific position is to not make any assumptions about things we do not have evidence of.
It is if you should be seeing evidence. If on Monday you say Godzilla stomped along the 50 yard line of the Superbowl, the absence of evidence for this (not on TV) is definitely evidence of the absence of Godzilla. The lack of evidence for a worldwide flood 5,000 years ago or so is good evidence of the absence of this flood.
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> Or, let me introduce another analogy. Science is a hammer. It works great at putting in nails. And there are many, many nails. But one day we find a screw. Some theists take the hammer and use it on the screw, but that doesn’t work. Some atheists see the screw and ignore it, because it’s not a nail. Others (both theists and atheists) see the screw and wonder about it, despite our incapacity to hammer it.
However in this case we might say that neither a nail or a screw is there, and the things are connectorized and snap together. In other words, while we can understand that some people are interested in the “why” question, it is not proven that there is a why to be interested in.
> [@Babale](#):
>
> OK, but then shouldn’t we give equal credence to the idea of a creator as to the idea of there being no creator?
The Null Hypothesis must be that there is no creator. If not, you must give me a specific instance of a creator to be the default. Why would the western god be more reasonable than the Greek god or the Egyptian god or the Aztec god or my favorite, a grad student in some lab in another brane? To falsify the null hypothesis, you’d have to present some evidence. As far as I can tell, all predictions from creator god hypotheses have been proven to be false. Maybe there is a god somewhere in the universe who got it right, but he sure doesn’t seem to have visited us.
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2024, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/684 "2024-02-09T22:17:56Z")
> [@Babale](#):
>
> That sounds a lot like Stockholm Syndrome to me.
Or the first noble truth of Buddhism, “Life is suffering.” It’s a reality none of us can escape. It doesn’t say that suffering must therefore be good, only that we can’t find a satisfactory answer to the meaning of life without addressing the problem of suffering.
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### Author:  [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/685 "2024-02-10T00:50:00Z")
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> It is if you should be seeing evidence. If on Monday you say Godzilla stomped along the 50 yard line of the Superbowl, the absence of evidence for this (not on TV) is definitely evidence of the absence of Godzilla. The lack of evidence for a worldwide flood 5,000 years ago or so is good evidence of the absence of this flood.
Evidence of what? The only claim I’ve made is:
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> (If my perspective matters to anyone, I am an agnostic theist. That is, I believe in a God that is inherently unknowable. My religious heritage is non-dogmatic Christian.)
“God is inherently unknowable” is a non-falsifiable statement. Falsifiable states like “Godzilla stomped along the 50 yard line of the Superbowl” or “a worldwide flood 5,000 years ago” are not pertinent to this discussion.
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> However in this case we might say that neither a nail or a screw is there, and the things are connectorized and snap together. In other words, while we can understand that some people are interested in the “why” question, it is not proven that there is a why to be interested in.
I’m not sure what you’re saying here. Are you denying that people have unanswerable questions? Because that’s what the screw in my analogy is. Can you restate?
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/686 "2024-02-10T02:13:36Z")
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> Others (both theists and atheists) see the screw and wonder about it, despite our incapacity to hammer it.
Thank you for that wonderful analogy; I feel seen.
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### Author:  [@Biffster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffster)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/687 "2024-02-10T18:00:24Z")
> [@Babale](#):
>
> At the end of the day, without a sentient Creator, you end up with explanations of the mechanics that make things function the way they do, but never with a _purpose_ to these things.
>
> So if we ask “why” hoping to find a purpose, we are barking up the wrong tree.
Why do you need a sentient creator to explain the purposeful functionality of things? What can’t things just be? Or evolve to gain functionality?
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/688 "2024-02-10T19:26:49Z")
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> “God is inherently unknowable” is a non-falsifiable statement. Falsifiable states like “Godzilla stomped along the 50 yard line of the Superbowl” or “a worldwide flood 5,000 years ago” are not pertinent to this discussion.
I was speaking generically. Lots of people use “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” but that is not correct in certain situations. And atheists are considering the question of god’s existence. If there is no evidence a particular instance of god exists we don’t have to worry about whether he is knowable.
And of course many theists on one hand say god is unknowable and on the other claim to know exactly what he thinks about or sex lives.
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> I’m not sure what you’re saying here. Are you denying that people have unanswerable questions? Because that’s what the screw in my analogy is. Can you restate?
“What’s the difference between a duck?” Unanswerable question, but absurd. Maybe why questions are absurd to, viewed from a certain perspective. That’s not to say worrying about why is stupid or anything like that, just that there is a valid position that the question is meaningless for a certain view of reality. Why kind of presupposes there is a conscious creator. If there is an entity controlling the world why did that flood happen makes sense. If not, it just happened. We can find the physical causes, but we’re not going to find anyone who set it off for some kind of purpose.
That’s one of my objections to the concept of an omnibenevolent god. Why did that flood happen? It maximizes good in some way because a baby who was drowned might grow up to be a dictator. Yech. Or, for a non-omnibenevolent god, why not? We’re lower than ants to him. Also yech.
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### Author:  [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/689 "2024-02-10T19:46:45Z")
> [@Biffster](#):
>
> What can’t things just be? Or evolve to gain functionality?
They can. The specific term “purpose” implies intention, though.
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### Author:  [@Biffster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffster)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/690 "2024-02-10T20:21:02Z")
> [@Babale](#):
>
> They can. The specific term “purpose” implies intention, though.
Perhaps, but not necessarily. It may be the intention of water to cut through rock to join with the next body of water, but that does not mean it requires a supreme being to direct it. Maybe that’s just what water does.
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### Author:  [@Guapo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guapo)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/691 "2024-02-10T20:26:30Z")
[quote=“crowmanyclouds, post:625, topic:962965”]
Which is interesting since Christianity answers that question from both Jesus and, far more importantly, Paul, _there are no good people_.
[/quote]But certainly there are better people. A child that suffers and dies from leukemia is better than a child molester that is never caught and lives to a ripe old age.
It takes a lot of mental gymnastics to explain why a God would allow worse things to happen to better people. Atheism does not answer the why, but it makes the question moot. It’s no longer why, but how.
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### Author:  [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/692 "2024-02-10T20:29:28Z")
> [@Guapo](#):
>
> But certainly there are better people. A child that suffers and dies from leukemia is better than a child molester that is never caught and lives to a ripe old age.
Does one get into heaven while the other doesn’t?
If so, which is which?
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### Author:  [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/693 "2024-02-10T20:30:31Z")
> [@Biffster](#):
>
> It may be the intention of water to cut through rock to join with the next body of water
I have never heard water described as having “intention”, except maybe poetically. Intent is not something inanimate objects have.
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### Author:  [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/694 "2024-02-10T20:36:49Z")
> [@Babale](#):
>
> I have never heard water described as having “intention”, except maybe poetically. Intent is not something inanimate objects have.
I sometimes heard such figurative speech from teachers and profs explaining physical processes, for instance a prof explained to us “Current isn’t dumb. It wants to follow the path of lowest resistance”. We all knew of course that he didn’t mean it literally.
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/695 "2024-02-10T21:25:15Z")
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> Maybe why questions are absurd to, viewed from a certain perspective. That’s not to say worrying about why is stupid or anything like that, just that there is a valid position that the question is meaningless for a certain view of reality.
Some religions view the question as meaningless, too. The why of existence is not a priority in many Buddhist circles (I venture to say _most_, but I’m not an expert on Buddhist philosophy), and there is an old story where the student asks, “Is there a God?” And the Buddha replies, “If you were shot with an arrow, what would be more important? Figuring out who made the arrow, or removing it from your body?”
One of the reasons I was drawn to Zen Buddhism in particular is that it’s so freakin’ practical and irreverent. After a chilldhood spent as an obsessively devout Christian, I didn’t want any kind of dogma to obsess over. Sit down here? Pay attention to my breathing? Got it.
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/696 "2024-02-10T21:28:08Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#):
>
> I sometimes heard such figurative speech from teachers and profs explaining physical processes, for instance a prof explained to us “Current isn’t dumb. It wants to follow the path of lowest resistance”. We all knew of course that he didn’t mean it literally.
I think you’ve hit on the explanation for gods. We impute intentionality to everything. We say “my car doesn’t want to start.” We yell at our computers. It is hard to talk about evolution without slipping into terms like “the giraffe grew a long neck in order to eat higher branches.”
If we understand these areas we can catch ourselves, but doing this is very human.
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### Author:  [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2024, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/697 "2024-02-10T21:55:11Z")
> **[Agent detection](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_detection)**
>
> Agent detection is the inclination for animals, including humans, to presume the purposeful intervention of a sentient or intelligent agent in situations that may or may not involve one.
> It is believed that humans evolved agent detection as a survival strategy. In situations where one is unsure of the presence of an intelligent agent (such as an enemy or a predator), there is survival value in assuming its presence so that precautions can be taken. For example, if a human came across an indentat...
Or, more accurately, hypersensitive agency detection.
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### Author:  [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)
#### Post date: [February 12, 2024, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/698 "2024-02-12T15:04:45Z")
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> “What’s the difference between a duck?” Unanswerable question, but absurd. Maybe why questions are absurd to, viewed from a certain perspective. That’s not to say worrying about why is stupid or anything like that, just that there is a valid position that the question is meaningless for a certain view of reality. Why kind of presupposes there is a conscious creator. If there is an entity controlling the world why did that flood happen makes sense. If not, it just happened. We can find the physical causes, but we’re not going to find anyone who set it off for some kind of purpose.
Thank you for the concise description. (You’d do better with another sample question, because “between a duck” is not well constructed English. Your intent is clear and we don’t need a language hijack, so let’s go with what you have.)
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> Science is a hammer. It works great at putting in nails. And there are many, many nails. But one day we find a screw. Some theists take the hammer and use it on the screw, but that doesn’t work. Some atheists see the screw and ignore it, because it’s not a nail. Others (both theists and atheists) see the screw and wonder about it, despite our incapacity to hammer it.
I think we’re pretty much in agreement, but on different tracks. You’re in the second track, while I’m in the third.
> [@Babale](#):
>
> > [@Biffster](#):
> >
> > It may be the intention of water to cut through rock to join with the next body of water
>
> I have never heard water described as having “intention”, except maybe poetically. Intent is not something inanimate objects have.
Is the “animate” vs “inanimate” distinction supported by the scientific method? On one hand, there’s the stream of water slowly cutting through rock, which is called “inanimate” because it’s just a bunch of fundamental particles mechanically following the laws of physics. On the other hand, we have a specimen of _H. sapiens_ ordering a ham sandwich, which is “animate” even though it’s it’s just a bunch of fundamental particles mechanically following the laws of physics. I think calling something “animate” is a quirk of the way we try to comprehend things and isn’t supportable by science.
But it’s okay: I believe in God and you\* believe in animate collections of particles. We’re both using something other than the scientific method when trying to understand what’s around us.
I also don’t think that “intent” is something that can be supported by the scientific method. If one limits oneself to only what can be determined by science, _every_ “why” question must be answered by “how”.
\*Me too.
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [February 12, 2024, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/699 "2024-02-12T17:56:25Z")
> [@Pleonast](#):
>
> You’d do better with another sample question, because “between a duck” is not well constructed English
It’s a joke line from the 1930s or something (yes, I’m old) so I’m not about to defend it grammatically.
Milton Berle had nothing on me.
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### Author:  [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)
#### Post date: [February 13, 2024, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-so-many-people-still-believe-in-god/962965/700 "2024-02-13T00:17:01Z")
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> It’s a joke line from the 1930s or something (yes, I’m old) so I’m not about to defend it grammatically.
Reminds me of Chico Marx’s line about “why a duck.”
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