There Is No God

In four excellent books, The End of Faith, by Sam Harris, The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins, Atheist Universe, by David Mills, and God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, by Christopher Hitchens, the authors make a compelling case that religion is divisive, intolerant, and dangerous. They point to the fact that most of the armed conflicts in the world today are based on differences in religion. Although I agree with what they say, I would like to offer the subversive suggestion that the evils of religion are quite beside the point.

The point is that there is no such thing as “God,” and we, as thinking creatures of nature, should not invest our conscious beliefs in angels, saints, and gods. We do not need to prove that religion is bad rather than good. We need only observe the obvious fact that religion is, as Richard Dawkins says, a delusion.

It is just as irrelevant to claim that religion is bad for mankind as it is to claim that it is a force for the good. Religious believers can point to the fact that religion is a comfort to people at times of sorrow, pain, and fear. The idea of an afterlife is attractive to humans whom nature has endowed with a fear of death. Religions promulgate ethical norms that many people can agree upon. Religious people have been known to perform great acts of charity in the name of God and have stood in the forefront of social movements for the betterment of society. So what?

The fact is that there is absolutely no evidence for the existence of God. We can prove the existence of everything else on earth, but we cannot prove that there is a God. Unlike scientific theories, which are subject to verification and falsification, we cannot go into a laboratory or an astronomical observatory and conduct an experiment to prove that there is a God. He does not show-up at meetings of the United Nations or appear on television. He is conveniently invisible and un-provable.

An astonishing majority of the Earth’s population spend their lives on bended knee, worshiping imaginary beings, venerating unseen vapors, glorifying nonexistent ghosts. The human race is like a pack of little children wandering mindlessly in a fairy land.

I hold that the proper object of our intellects is truth, and that regardless of whether truth is good or bad for us, it is necessary to adhere to it. The truth that there is no such thing as “God” would seem to me to be so compelling that we have to violate the core of our mental apparatus in order to deny it. Although we are brainwashed by parents, teachers, clergy, and witchdoctors to believe that there is some invisible power out there governing our lives, we should, by the time we reach adulthood, be able to weigh the enormous improbability of such a claim.

Polls say that the vast majority of Americans believe in God. However, they also believe in UFO aliens, Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, witches, signs of the Zodiac, and John Edward’s conversations with the departed. I am told that many intellectuals, scientists, and college professors believe in God. Shame on them! They are either mentally lazy or intellectually spineless. They are the real sinners of life. They have the equipment to apprehend the truth, and yet they cling to ancient myths and fabrications in order to share in the opiate of the people.

The mathematician, William K. Clifford, put it well when he said: “It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.” To Clifford, the life of the man who suppresses doubts and avoids inquiry about questions which might disturb belief is “one long sin against mankind.”

The most basic question is not whether belief in God is good for us or bad for us. It is whether God exists at all. Your mother should have told you this long ago. He doesn’t.