"Why do a lot of people
believe in a god?" Well, if an atheist always says that he is smarter
than the average person, is that tantamount to the idea that all
other people are that dumb?"

A typical atheist will respond to this question more of an insult
than an answer. I have seen reasons like, `Well because believing is
easier.", and "Because people are afraid of hell fire." or
worst, "Believers are just too dumb and illogical compare with an
atheist." Such answers show more of ignorance in the atheist's camp.
Loutish answers like this gives atheism a bad rep. On the part of the
atheists, to demean and belittle people whose belief is different on
their belief, and calling these people to be crazy, inferior or
stupid is an attitude born of his failure to understand the
biological purpose of belief and the neurological necessity for them
to believe. It is likely that the answer is base on ignorance and
arrogance and not wisdom and knowledge. Tandaan natin, wala pang
Filipino scientist na nag profess na un-believer sya. We have allot
of doctors, lawyers and proffessionals outthere that believe in a
certain god-concept. Our government officials are all believers. And
let us not forget, Mr. Ernie Baron is a believer (lol!) So don't tell
me you're smarter than them. O baka naman smart ka lang dahil sa
powers ng "copy-paste" technology?

So why do allot of people believe?

Let us take a good look at some of these atheist's claims. Do
believers believe because they are afraid of hell fire? Para namang
Saturday morning cartoons yan. Well, I have to admit, dati ganyan din
ang paniniwala ko. But my atheism has already matured. Gone are the
days of bias conclusions. Kailangan open-minded ka to be a serious
atheist.

Now back to the topic.
Not all god-concept is followed by the concept of punishment. Today,
Universalism doesn't have hell fire yet they believe in a deity.
Let's go back in pre-history. In the Upper Paleolithic age, humans
have already invented religion 35,000 to 11,000 years ago. There are
evidence that Neanderthals buried their dead with rituals, and there
have been verification of Goddess worship, yet there are no evidence
of belief in hell-fire and eternal damnation for unbelievers. Those
religions don't have any idea of hell fire, but yet they believe in
the after-life.

Freethinking friends of mine at Luneta have tackled this enigma and
this is what they come up with. Accordingly, it is but human to look
for something bigger or stronger than you. You can link that to the
idea that God is sometimes considered synonymous with a "supreme-
being". Once upon a time you considered your father to be supreme,
someone stronger than you. Then sooner or later you realized that his
powers are limited. You may have seen his weakness. It is necessary
to crate an idea of something more superior that your father or
anything else in this world, VIOLA! We now have a god. Creating a god
is so easy – all you need is a proper imagination about something
that which nothing greater can be conceived. But why do you need
something more superlative than you and everything that exist? I
remember an advertisement of a bank which says, "Sa PNB, para kang
nakasandal sa pader." Believing in a god is like trusting your life
to an invisible support. There is a tendency for humans to think that
they are too weak, a low self esteem, and that we need something more
superior from us to save us in times of trouble. I call
this "Superman Mentality". If you sometimes notice, when you watch a
sci-fiction superhero shows, Earthlings have this tendency to rely on
alien beings or alien technology to save him for destruction, just
because it is in our mentality that something alien or something "up
there" will solve our problems. Now, who can forget Darna, that
before she can save us from the evils of Valentina, she must swallow
a stone that came from another planet, or how about Flavio who
created this sword from a meteorite, which still came somewhere out
there. In the Philippines for example, we have this idea that
anything made in foreign soil is more superior. Ideas from overseas
are better. We always look up at a person taller or physically
attractive to be more intelligent or an able leader. Likas na sa tao
ang tumingin sa mas-nakakataas o mag-isip ng mas hihigit pa sa kanya.
Hindi ito kababawan na utak.

Another reason for believing is to satisfy the most philosophical
questions of life. The questions, "What is the purpose of
living?", "Why are you here?", "Is there life after death?" are
satisfied by the god-belief., specially the life after death
question.

The culprit of all of this belief is the human brain. Remember that
our brain other function is to ensure our survival, to keep us alive.
Now there are internal and external forces in which the brain must
defend us for harm. Senses alone are not sufficient on this job so
the brain must also rely from external factors. One of these factors
is what we called belief. Belief is a survival tool to augment and
enhance the danger-identification of our senses. It extends the range
of the senses to detect danger and improve the chances to survive in
unfamiliar territories. Because beliefs do not require immediate
sensory data to be able to feed valuable survival information to the
brain, they have additional survival function of providing
information about life that does not deal directly with sensory
activities. These are area of abstractions and principle that
involves such thing as "reason", "cause" and "meaning". So, belief is
a part of the human brain after all.

Some people are plague by philosophical questions, like Soren
Kierkegaard for example, and for some of them, these unanswered
philosophical questions are answered by a 3 letter word G-O-D. You
cannot simple answer philosophical questions; it needs faith to have
the sense that these queries have already been responded. If you
already think that these questions have been answered then you began
to have a sense of contentment and peace. Contentment and peace
equals less stress, less stress means less sickness. And to top it
all, an assurance of after-life will also give our brain ammunition
to shield us to the most dreaded harm of all: DEATH.

So not all atheists think that believers are
dumb and dim-witted. It's just about a uniquely higher brain function
(not intelligence) that an atheist has which enable him to have this
ability to control his most natural and fundamental biological urges.