Why Is Anybody Convinced There Is A God?

Sorry to quote myself, but the edit function just wasn't working right.

I wanted to add, there is NO convincing evidence of a god, the people who believe there is one, believe it because they want to.  For whatever reason they want to: to feel better, to feel that they as individuals matter, because they were indoctrinated as children, to gain control over others, because they fear death...  It is used for many purposes.  Doesn't mean a god actually exists.

What does exist is natural law.  We see it play out on a daily basis.  There is ample evidence.  It is why I don't believe in a god in the sense of an entity that put all this into motion.  Natural law suffices.  There is no personal connection to any one individual.  

I question why we as humans have evolved with this need to believe in a personal god.  And, in the face of so much evidence of how the world really works from science, why do we cling to that need to believe?

I'm limiting my ontology to what's factually the case, yes.

Mental phenomena that are only mental phenomena, such as desires or aesthetic judgments, for example, can't be an illusion, because there's nothing to get wrong.  Illusions require that something really is such and such way, but you get it wrong for particular sorts of reasons (which we could detail).  Meaning is one example of something that is a mental phenomenon only, and thus it can't be illusory.  (Though someone could have the mistaken belief that meaning isn't mental only.)

Re perceptual content, I'm a "direct realist."  It's worth noting that epistemically, there's no justification for saying that anything is an illusion unless we (a) know how it really is, but (b) know that our perception of it doesn't match how it really is (for the sorts of reasons that normally account for illusions).  However, if we know this, then we completely undermine the notion that everything could be an illusion.  If we don't know (a) and (b), there is no grounds for saying that anything is an illusion.  So "everything is an illusion" is quite nonsensical.

Finally, that something is physical in no way implies that it's permanent.

Let's try it this way:

You walk into your kitchen and see your refrigerator.

In your view, that experience, including seeing the refrigerator, is an illusion.

So here's the question: "How would we know, or why would we believe, that the refrigerator we see is an illusion?"

What is your answer to that?

You're further fleshing out your view here, but that's not what I'm asking you to do.  I'm asking you how do we know what that view is claiming?

"It is a projected illusion of the power of the ego mind" is your view.  I'm asking you "How do we know that the refrigerator is a projected illusion of the power of the ego mind"?

Or "How do we know that it is a projected creation of a refrigerator that you have manifested into your life"?

I'm not asking you to further flesh out your view.  I'm familiar with your view, or at least with views very similar to it.

I'm asking you to support that it's the case over competing views.  How do we know it?  In other words, in the sense of why would we believe that?  What's the support of it?

My two cents.

There is no objective truth available to humans. Any human who interacts with the world has a subjective view of it.
And any human view is not only subjective, but incomplete. Therefore, in order for humans to make sense of the world, they make models.

Maybe for some humans, models including deities or other supernatural intelligences make sense. Like gadreel said, to him a universe with an intelligence behind him is a model that he is comfortable with (gadreel, feel free to correct me if this presentation is inaccurate). To me, it doesn't. I tend to be materialist and not believe in supernatural entities. The naturalistic explanations are enough for me. But I don't claim that I know everything about the universe, or that I have found an objective answer.

In fact, I believe the religious-philosophical-spiritual outlook of each human on the universe is a bit like choosing a map projection for a world map.

There are plenty of them, all of them with advantages or disadvantages. If you want a map that facilitates navigation, choose Mercator. If you want a map that keeps the size and shapes of the landmasses, choose Dymaxion or Authagraph. If you want to just check longitudes and latitudes, choose a cylindrical projection. And so on.
And all the map projections have one thing in common: They are incomplete. It is not possible to make an accurate 2D model of a 3D object.

Maybe for questions in life, philosophies and religions are like map projections. If you want an outlook where you want to believe that there is higher meaning, or some sort of higher purpose independent of humans, choose a theistic religion. If you believe that life is simply an opportunity to have fun and enjoy it, but has no external purpose, choose an atheistic religion. And no philosophy and religion can claim to be accurate; unless objective truths would be available to humans.

The problem arises when some people try to convince others that their model is the best, or even the only possible one.
As long as it happens only on message boards, there's no serious problem. Unfortunately, the people in New York, London, Madrid, Berlin, Brussels, Nice, and now Barcelona, know that this is not the case.

Speaking of map projections: I don't know if I agree with everything in this comic. But I like it.

I can see how that is true of "everything is an illusion" but what about the stance of "everything could be an illusion"?

People don't want to take responsibility for their own lives and actions. A way out of their suffering, is for some other separate entity to deal with it for them. That is a cop out. What they don't understand, is that they are the god force, and the power of creation and everything in our projected realities needs to be accounted for. Masters of our own universe. How else do we acknowledge our own attitude, behaviors\beliefs and contributions here in our lifetime\s, if we don't take on personal onus for what is going on around us?