4mer_smoker

The concept of "God" is just an easy approach to the unsolved mysteries and theories of the universe. There is too much unknown about this universe and existence in general for one to rationally hold that God has made humans in His image and differentiates us from all other forms of life. In reality, humans simply have a greater ability to make complex associations, and many people confuse this for some sort of divine consciousness or soul.

Because it is not rational to believe that we have a "soul," it should not be anymore logical to believe in an afterlife. Sure, we may think we are quite important here on earth, but this is due to our relative ignorance of the rest of the universe. Really, humans are social creatures with a great capacity for association and enhanced intelligence due to evolutions in communication such as written language. We don't even know what is at the depths of our oceans, so it is irrational to make any assumptions as to the true nature of our existence.

As a philosophy and psychology major, these are my educated deductions. Humans are associative creatures, so people have the tendency to attach associations to things, even if they do not have all the information. This is ignorance, but it is also necessary since it is impossible and quite inefficient to try to gather ALL information before making a simple association. Without assumptions, we would go nowhere. Thusly, it should be apparent that the concept of God or a supreme entity is a fabrication to fill a void of understanding. We WANT and NEED to have a reason for existing to satisfy our natural tendencies. "God" and the "afterlife" are relatively acceptable justifications for this tendency. Most cannot accept that we don't and probably will never have all the necessary information to make an ultimately correct association between ourselves and the outside world.

As Marx once said, "religion is the opiate of the masses." From a psychological and philosophical standpoint, I find this is very true. The concept of religion and "God" are soothing on the human mind. Humans are not content to simply accept that something occurs. They want to explore as to the reasons of its existence. If they are told that God exists, they want to find out why and where. They are not satisfied with the answer that the world came to existence by certain scientific reasons that are not fully explained. Humans are happier with a religious explanation because it rests in the idea of a Supreme Being that people are afraid of, and feel secure in, like a child is to a parent.

It is important to understand that religious ideas are given out as teachings. They are not precipitates of experience or end results of thinking, rather they are illusions, fulfillments of the oldest, strongest and most urgent wishes of humanity.