Is religion really just the human way to settle our fear of the unknown?

Question

Not one civilization has really survived without religion. I'm an atheist, but do you think us concealing our fear behind a system of beliefs is the best path, or will it ultimately lead to our destruction?

Answer 1

An individual human and the society that he lives in can be looked at as a microcosm and a macrocosm. Given that, many functions that take place within the individual human will find their correlations in society at large. Within the individual, there is the tendency to formulate ego -- defense mechanisms in response to subjective anxiety and stress. Pretty much, when something is causing us stress, and we don't know what it is or we don't know how to handle it, we develop anxiety and later on, defense mechanisms. In society, there are many things that cause us stress and anxiety because we don't know what they are or we don't know how to handle them. Things like death, sickness, evil, wars, and the fact that morals and civil laws are not as constant and integral as physical laws all present a certain type of stress for which the world's religions arise as a method by which to cope with the madness. In short, religion is a society's defense mechanism.

Ego defense mechanisms exist in order to protect our ego, or how we perceive ourselves, from any change or adjustments that we may have to make because of a stressor. Two people can be faced with the same stressor, but they require different defense mechanisms because they have different egos, different concepts of themselves. And if you look at the many religions of the world, they usually reflect upon the cultural awareness of the region in which they were conceived. If we look at religion, not from how we have categorized it, but rather from the perspective of what functions it performs for us, we will see that there are many other things that perform the same functions. In modern times, science and art are functioning in much the same manner as religion for many individuals. They too are being used to protect our self image from fears of the unknown. When you asked the question: is this the best path? I think you would also have to ask: at what stage is our collective cultural awareness? I think it is only once you have determined this can you ascertain whether or not religion is still necessary. It is true that religion has caused many wars and strife, however, it's been around for over 6000 years and we are more overpopulated today than we've ever been. So, I'm not sure that it is what would lead to our destruction.

Answer 2

There is a difference between religion and spirituality. Religion is what a given established order teaches or proclaims to be true, conviction is what your intuition tells you is true or not. Religion's written history or the Scriptures date back to some 6.000 years, going back to the Hindu Vedas, Pharaonic and Judeo-Christian beliefs. Abraham is accepted as the first believer in a One and Only God, and I myself think that Akhenaton of Egypt was a contemporary.All civilizations are born, thrive, climax, decline and disappear and religion is not any guarantee of eternal survival, rather in some cases it is what doomed certain civilizations to destruction !

Answer 3

Atheism requires more faith than, say, Christianity. To be an athiest, you have to know everything about everything to know that there is no God. If you think you know more than everyone else, what are the results? You cannot learn, because you know everything. You cannot change, because you have already consumated all existance.

Your arguement is based on the arguement of evil.

"The atheist’s reasoning is circular. Former atheist C. S. Lewis argued that, in order to know there is injustice in the world one has to have a standard of justice. So, to effectively eliminate God via evil one is to posit an ultimate moral standard by which to pronounce God evil (Mere Christianity). But for theists God is the ultimate moral standard, since there cannot be an ultimate moral law without an Ultimate Moral Law Giver.
Atheists argue that an absolutely good God must have a good purpose for everything, but there is no good purpose for much of the evil in the world. Hence, there cannot be an absolutely perfect God.
Theists point out that just because we do not know the purpose for evil occurrences does not mean that there is no good purpose. This argument does not necessarily disprove God; it only proves our ignorance of God’s plan. Along the same reasoning, just because we do not see a purpose for all evil now, does not follow that we never will. The atheist is premature in his judgment. According to theism, a day of justice is coming. If there is a God, he must have a good purpose for evil, even if we do not know it. For a theistic God is omniscient and knows everything. He is omnibenevolent and has a good reason for everything. So, by his very nature he must have a good reason for evil.
Purposelessness. In assuming that life is without purpose, the atheist is again both a presumptuous and premature judge. How does one know there is no ultimate purpose in the universe? Simply because the atheist knows no real purpose for life does not mean God does not have one. Most people have known times that made no sense for the moment but eventually seemed to have great purpose."

Answer 4

I might have thought that some years ago. But with the advent of the Internet, for the first time in human history we are able to reach out beyond those people who make up our own family, our own community, and the residents of our own small neck o'th woods, to talk to, interract with, and exchange thoughts, feelings, beliefs, opinions and ideas with people from virtually anywhere in the world whom we would never have known existed but for this new technology. I believe it is slowly going to help us recognise that beyond the culture in which we were born and raised, beyond our skin color, beyond our different life patterns and social status, as human beings we have far more in common than we have things that divide us. I believe that it will slowly dawn on more and more people, that religion (theistic beliefs) is one of the most confrontational, polarizing, divisive, and socially destructive elements ever devised by man. We should be who WE are, and not what other people have brain-conditioned us from an early age to accept alliegance to, and this or that theistic belief system is right at the very top of that brainwashing list of things that we have bashed into our heads from the time we first begin to comprehend what people are saying to us.
Down through all the pages of human history, no greater evils have been perpetrated by human beings against their fellow creatures, and the planet upon which we all live, than what has been committed in the name of this or that "religion". Love or hate that "evolution" word, we ARE evolving... . mentally, psychologically, philosophically, and observationally, and the Internet has lit a fire behind the rocket that will shoot us to new heights of self discovery till the point will surely come when we will reject these man-made phony "differences" and help us to replace them with a far greater wisdom than our species has ever known.
That new wisdom will make it possible for man to cast off the chains of "religious conflict" and meet one another as equals and partners, to confront, share, join forces against, and ultimately overcome the fables, fantasies and phonyness of all those beliefs that have artificially divided us for thousands of years. We have fallen because we were divided. A time is coming when Humanity will no longer be "a house divided" but a house united, and a House United will overcome all things, including the fears that once held us bound.

Answer 5

I am an atheist too, but i find religion as an thinking that give people the feeling of belonging to particular group and just a way to control people by leading them to believe in a particular ideology, most people just follow blindly or by birth. I think world will be a better place without the boundaries of religion and living for one cause live and let live........

Answer 6

Generally there is fear of the unknown .but there are reasons for this fear May be it is the fear of responsibilities or fearing something which may be far away from what we believe so fear of changing our beliefs if you seek honestly God is very well known and millions of proofs for God's existing are available

Answer 7

No. I know that Jews, Christians, and Muslims each have in writing what I call the two or more witnesses principle. So apparently God(orAllah) expects 2 or more 'witnesses' to confirm things. Man may settle for '1 witness' (i.e. man; self) So is Judaism, Christianity, and/or Islam in simple form a decision by man to either go up to God's level, or supposedly bring God down to man's level?

Answer 8

people had to believe in something, like they were made by this all powerful person or so, so that they could believe their existence wasn't pointless. Now people don't need it as much, so, yeah, it probably will ultimatly lead to the destruction of people and the world cuz people tear it up for their beliefs.

Answer 9

religion is not about fear, it's about having a purpose for existence. death kills the goal. ignoring death is not an answer. living without a purpose is hell. i was an atheist for 3 years. i had to lie to my self in order not to loose my mind. some how the mind do not function without a purpose, and i hated worshiping myself.

Answer 10

It's a way of finding certainty in an uncertain world-it constructs a framework that allows us to rationalise our existence which otherwise might seem totally meaningless.