We do all live with delusions. Mine is that we can be greater than we are now, that humankind can eventually reach the planets, and then move out into the stars, and eventually spread out from our earth. My greatest wish is that my daughter might one day stand on the surface of the moon.

As for my disagreements with religion: I've seen what it can do to rationality. Baghdad went from being the center of enlightenment to being... well, what it was 100 years ago. This was due in a large part to the influence of fundamentalist Islam.

Now, in the United States, fundamentalist Christians are working hard to do the same to the western world. They fight against the teaching of evolution, using misinformation as a weapon.  They wish to disallow basic rights to homosexuals, such as the right to legal marriage. They would shut down entire fields of research based on a morality that is based on religion, not ethics. They would have the worst possible President based on the candidate's faith, rather than their suitability for the position.

Anyone who sacrifices truth, ethics, and judgement simply for the sake of their religion is dangerous. There isn't a perception of a threat-- it is a threat.

That doesn't even touch on the ethics of information. I believe it is unethical to spread false information. Every decision we make relies on information. If that information is inaccurate, or worse, downright wrong, the decisions will be poor. These decisions adversely affect real lives, every day. I know that theists don't all spread misinformation. I also know there are a lot of non-theists who spread a lot of misinformation (even atheists, probably including me).

It's gotten to the point where sorting truth from lies is becoming increasingly difficult. I try to confront misinformation wherever it may be. One place is with theism.

Excellent questions. There's a lot of research going on concerning these very questions.

This doesn't address your questions directly, but I found it quite a good read:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0307277224

It's "Intelligent Thought." It's a collection of essays by various scientists generally concerning a rebuttal of Intelligent Design. However, there's some very good essays on evolution in general, and cognitive evolution specifically.

One thing to keep in mind while thinking about evolution: there is no goal. And also, not every trait has to provide a benefit. For a trait to survive, it simply must not put an organism at a disadvantage compared to other organisms filling the same local niche.

I can surmise why self-consciousness was beneficial, though. Self-awareness makes abstract threat assessment easier. When you can think ahead about how the world will affect you over the next several hours, for instance, you have an advantage over those who do not have the same ability. These are also the same traits that led to rationalism-- the better you are at modelling the real world, the more accurate your threat assessment will be.

I think the whole bit where we learned to ask, "Why?" was simply a byproduct of that. However, that's my own speculation. As I don't do research, I'll let someone else prove or disprove that thesis.

I think that's because you are a Christian in Europe. I've found in my (limited) travels, that the U.S. has a special breed of Christian. Not all U.S. Christians are like this, but many are; enough to rather sour one on the whole religion. This comes from personal experience: I was raised Christian during my formative years, renounced Christ when I was in my young teens, and I married a fundamentalist Christian while I was in the army. I was with her for about two very good yars, and one very bad one.

In my experience, the traits of these special U.S. Christians are:

1) A very literal interpretation of the Bible.

Every word of the Bible is the literal truth. The world is only 6,000 to 10,000 years old, because that's about how much time passed between Adam and Eve, and today.

2) Wilful ignorance.

They would rather ignore the results of scientific research than revise their dogmatic, literal interpretation of the Bible. This leads to denying evolution, for instance. (There's other things they deny too, like huge parts of astronomy, as that disproves their conception of a young earth.)

3) A conviction that they and their congregation are the only True Christians.

I hear it all the time: "Oh, they don't believe foo, which is quite plainly stated in the Bible, and so they aren't Real Christians."

"Foo" can be full body immersion baptism vs. sprinkling; or it can mean that a wife are supposed to serve the husband, and the husband is her master; or any other such matter of Biblical interpretation. The Bible is quite literal, and so there is only one possible interpretation.

4) An aggressive distrust of anyone not of their faith.

Here, "faith" often means their own congregation. Their distrust of a person is in direct proportion to the difference in Biblical interpretation.

5) A certainty that non-Christians are out to destroy them, and to destroy the concept of God.

Well, they're partly right in this. I used to think it was OK to simply allow theists to go on about their business. I used to think there was something noble in simply believing in God, and following whatever righteous path you might find.

Then, as Christians began attacking secularism here in the U.S., I realized they were not going to allow others to follow their own paths to righteousness. You could say the Intelligent Design movement was the proverbial straw. Once I saw the devious and manipulative way in which the ID proponents used disinformation, I realized they were truly evil.

So, now I am out to help bring Christians back into rationality, and away from the brink. So, in a way, I am out to destroy God.

I don't mean that I wish to convince them that God doesn't exist. That would be a bonus, but really, I still admire true personal faith. As you say, we all have our delusions, and faith in God is hardly the worst possible delusion, as long as it doesn't lead you to do evil things. The problem is, too many people don't keep it personal; they wish to spread it to everything and every one, whether other people desire it or not; and this leads to evil things.

I also get het up about Microsoft, and the way they've destroyed the computing industry. That doesn't make it a religion. It makes it an area in which I react irrationally. Atheism is, by definition, a lack of belief in God. That makes it a non-religion. Just because a person doesn't believe in God doesn't mean they can't get emotional about the subject.

So, you couldn't rationally consider atheism a religion in the least.

If what you believe leads you to do evil things, such as kill another person in the name of your faith, or work to have your school teach intelligent design in science class, then yes, what you believe is important. If your faith causes you to act in a way that is detrimental to another person, then yes, your belief does matter.

This is true for atheists, as well.

I realize that sounds as if I'm saying, "Behave like me, or not at all," but I'm not. I love variety in the world. I certainly believe your faith can affect you in a good way, too. But in the end, there is no rational evidence for either God, or the validity of the Bible (or whatever your Holy book might be).

Whatever we believe, I do know this: we're in this together.

Thanks, Natural.

Not to turn this into a mutual admiration club or anything, but the same things has happened to me a couple of times reading your posts.

And I'm glad to be here.

I think my brain just melted.

"How do you know that you can't know what the higher purpose is anyway?"

"One of His legs is both the same."

   What are we trying to accomplish here ? WE are GOD , now what ? .... how about F U N ...... Why not worship F U N   Looking out the window of a mansion and seeing people needlessly suffer is not my idea of F U N .... 

Have you ever listened to Bill Hicks? One of the funniest men to ever walk the earth.

This is very much like his philosophy.

I'd suggest you start with "Relentless," one of his earlier works. It's probably his most accessible recording.

Basically, his entire point of doing comedy was that we realize there is a LIVING GOD, and we are all PART OF THAT LIVING GOD. That didn't enter enter his act until the very end, though he often references it obliquely.

"And I feel it's my duty to pass on information at all times, so that we can all learn, evolve, and get the fuck off this planet."

I myself do not believe there is a LIVING GOD. However, that doesn't mean I don't get his sentiment.

I definitely know we're all in this together, LIVING GOD or not.

Sorry it's taken so long for me to get back to you.

That's one way to put it.  It is after all based more at arguments I often have thrown my way by many christians as a response to them.

So in essence it's a bribe.  You simply do what you have been told to do so you can get more out of the next life?  It makes it sound to me like a sports game.  The person whose only goal is the trophy at the end will do anything they can within the rules (and break them if they can get away with it).  They will push themselves as hard as possible and have no qualms about hurting others in the process if it results in them acheiving said trophy.  Once the game is over, it's over.  They no longer care, they have what they came for.  Me, I prefer to be out there on the field for the game itself, enjoying it, helping my teammates, having fun, getting everything out of it that I can, and I certainly don't want to see harm come to the opposition.  When the whistle finally blows for me, the game still goes on for others.  My offspring, my teammates offspring, my oppositions offspring etc.  We need to leave them with somewhere that is still playable so that they can get as much out of the game as I did.

Are you kidding me?  My entire point (which you seem to have missed completely) was you may not think that you individually can make a difference - but once you get enough people individually then it makes larger numbers and those numbers may be enough for that difference to be made.  Due to that, it is worth people having their say and doing their thing to make a difference.

Evolution is a "how", not a "why".  You may as well be asking for a purpose from gravity.  The purpose I gave has got nothing to do with evolution.

Being an inanimate object that is nothing more than a tool for a being of higher sentience is a higher goal for a living being?  I kid, I do see the point you're making and if I put on my deist/theist coloured goggles I do agree.  In fact, it kind of backs up what I said before.  Evolution is not a why, it does not provide a purpose.  It is nothing more than a how.