Here are the ten reasons that have left me with no other choice than to be an atheist.

1. There seems to be no place for God in our evolution. Most scientists agree that our Universe began with a “Big Bang” about 13 billion years ago. We have no way of knowing now exactly what happened at the exact moment of the Big Bang but we do know what happened from a tiny fraction of a second later. The laws of physics came into existence, then later the elements. All this led to astronomical evolution – the formation of the stars and galaxies, and black holes. Then atoms of elements came together to form molecules – chemical evolution. Even some complex molecules such as occur on our planet were formed in interstellar space; we find them in meteorites and comet tails. We can produce many of these chemicals in the laboratory under conditions that probably obtained on earth soon after it was formed some 4.5 billion years ago. We have fossils of likely life forms that go back to at least 3.5 if not 3.8 billion years. Thus the very first life on our planet – the first living cell that satisfied the criteria of life as we know it today – must have arisen from the products of chemical evolution on our planet as it cooled down sometime between 3.5 and 4.0 billion years ago. Once we have the primitive cell, there is no difficulty in understanding how biological evolution gave us the variety that we find in the living species around us. Where is God in this scenario?

2. I have no problem in assuming that God was responsible for the Big Bang but after that it seems he must have died or lost total control, because everything soon afterwards followed the laws of science. So as a rational human being I have greater faith in these laws than in God since we are surely controlled by these laws today. There is not a shred of evidence to say that our universe is controlled by anything other than the laws of science.

3. How did God come in? Through our fear of the unknown. As our fear has diminished with our increasing knowledge, there has been less reason to believe in God. Today, we have reached a stage in our understanding of natural phenomena, including life, that we need no longer fear the unknown. We can say with confidence that where we do not have the answers, the answers will be found within the framework of science, if not today, then tomorrow.

4. Belief in God implies belief that man is special, something apart from the rest of the natural world. But man is not that special. He is a product of evolution from lower forms of life which, in turn, evolved from even lower forms, eventually taking us back to primitive micro-organisms which themselves must have originally been formed from non-living chemicals. Genetically speaking, we are 99 percent chimpanzee. The lowliest of bacteria make their chemical constituents exactly the same way we do, and most of these constituents are common to all forms of life. Every living system has nucleic acids, proteins, lipids and carbohydrates. Nucleic acids are made of three simple chemical entities: a basic compound which may be a purine or a pyrimidine, a sugar which may be ribose or deoxyribose, and phosphate. Every living organism, from the lowly bacterium, E.coli, to the mighty elephant, including man, makes its pyrimidines in exactly the same way, using the same set of chemical reactions within the living organism.
Therefore, if man is not unique, and all life evolved from non-living materials, where is the need to put man in a special category as a special creation of God?

5. Belief in God implies belief that God put man on Earth pre-formed, as stated in the Bible for example. But in light of what I have stated above, this is clearly not true. Man has been around for less than 2 million years, and all who are living in the world anywhere today are, probably, the progeny of a single woman (but not a single man!) who lived in Africa just about 200 000 years ago.

6. Those who believe in God, believe that God has a grand design. There is not a shred of proof in favour of this belief. In fact, all the evidence is against it. This is well argued in the book, Chance and Necessity, by the Nobel prize-winning French scientist, Jacques Monod. In this book, Monod presents incontrovertible arguments in support of the view that there is no design in the universe or in evolution.

7. Belief in God kills one’s initiative. If you believe that you can pass an examination by going to the Hindu temple of Lord Venkateshwara in the South Indian town of Tirupati and promising that you will sacrifice your hair to it (a common Hindu practice) if you pass the examination, there is no reason for you to study. If you believe that everything that is going to happen to you is pre-ordained, why make an effort to do something different from what may come your way without any effort? I believe that my destiny is in my hands and depends on the initiatives that I take. I simply don’t need God or his blessings or his help. I just prefer to depend on myself. I think it has paid rich dividends.

8. The practice of religion is highly dependent on the clergy and their role. I believe that clergy of all religions are guilty of seven deadly sins:
(i) They survive on misinterpretation of the teachings of the founders of their religion or its other respected leaders.
(ii) It was clergy that invented miracles and attributed them to the founders of the great religions.
(iii) The clergy invented the concept of “divinity” which implies that one’s life is totally controlled by what the “divine power” has ordained – while it is the clergy alone that can help you change the course of your destiny.
(iv) One of the paramount duties of the clergy everywhere has been first to discover or invent a legend and then present it as history.
(v) From the time of Galileo and Giordano Bruno until today’s America – where the President supports the teaching of creationism in schools – we see the clergy attempting to replace evidence and truth by belief and myth.
(vi) The clergy and their followers have always been the greatest promoters of war and conflict. Examples are the Crusades, the religious conflicts in Ireland and Central Europe, and the problem between India and Pakistan. The clergy impart feelings of superiority to their followers and then subtly convert such feelings into belief in the right to govern the inferior “other”.
(vii) The clergy keep their followers bound to laws that often have no basis in reason, Humanism or human rights.

9. I am willing to accept, as a matter of freedom of belief, a personalised view of God, which implies a direct personal relationship between the believer and his or her god. What I find difficult to accept is the institutionalisation of this belief involving clergy. This is tantamount to the imposition of unreason on people; it contradicts the value of evidence. Such an institutionalised belief in evidence-less faith is bound to lead to irrational decisions in every sphere of life, private or public.

10. There are enormous contradictions between science and religion. There is no compatibility whatsoever between science on the one hand and the dogma that defines each religion on the other. Science is irretrievably entwined with every aspect of our existence. We cannot escape believing in science and its product – technology, without which today’s existence would hardly be possible. It is not widely understood that belief in science implies rejection of religious dogma – of which the existence of God is an important component.

Science denies the existence of the supernatural: be it miracles, extra-sensory perception, clairvoyance, or psycho-kinesis. None of these phenomena have ever been unequivocally proven to exist. Whenever evidence has been presented in favour of any one of them, it has been invariably shown to be flawed. Religion is based on revelation – something which cannot be tested or repeated. Science has no place for revelation. The scientific method is based on reason and logic, and every scientific truth is testable and verifiable, and does not depend on the whims and fancies of individuals. Science allows one to make testable predictions. If these predictions turn out not to be true, the theory or law on which the predictions were based must be reviewed. Science, therefore, often progresses by disproving. This is simply not true of religion. The scientific method has a built-in corrective. There are no correctives in religion. Science is dynamic; it evolves and progresses by modification of what has existed earlier. By contrast, religion is static and cannot be modified. When a belief is modified in science, people give up the previous belief. By contrast, when a new religion emerges, it does not replace earlier religions. Science always looks into the future and the unsolved problems are always the most inspiring. The inspiration for those who are religious and believe in God comes from the past. One of the most important attributes of science is the right that it gives every one to question, while prescribing the conditions under which the questioning may be done, so that one excludes trivial questioning which has no basis. Religion has no place for questioning its premises which often have no rational, or even ethical or moral basis.

A scientist can say without any feeling of guilt or shame, “I don’t know.” Religious leaders would not be leaders if they did not claim to know everything and have answers to every question. There is only one science in the world. Science is, therefore, truly international. On the other hand, one of the great problems we have in India is that we have many religions which are often at war with one another. One way in which we often glorify religion is that it gives us values. The identity of a religion is not based on its values – which are common to all religions; it is based on the irrational, unscientific and unproven components of its dogma. The common values that all religions preach are indeed the values that science generates.

A question that is often asked is, “What about free will?” Indeed this was the question that racked the minds of some of the leading intellectuals of the last century, till Francis Crick gave a possible explanation in his book, The Astonishing Hypothesis.

There are indeed many unanswered questions and unsolved problems in science. That is what makes science exciting. For example, we don’t understand the basis of memory. However, we do know that whenever solutions are found they will be compatible with science. And when they are found, they will probably give rise to more questions! The problems that humanity faces, such as poverty, deprivation and conflict, concern every citizen of the world. What is important is to recognize that the only way to solve these problems is to adopt a scientific approach, taking facts into account. That is where we have failed. And that is where the role of those who believe in science and in reason becomes important. Truth is often one but lies can be any number. I believe in the power of truth to which science is committed – but religion is not. And I believe that a small number of people committed to truth, to Humanism, to science and to rationality can bring about a major change in the way that we live and function – a change that can be the starting point of the evolution of a peaceful world, characterized by equity, full opportunity for expressing the creative abilities of all, and abrogation of all conflicts.

Dr. P M Bhargava was the Vice-Chairman of the Knowledge Commission of the Government of India. This article is based on his keynote speech to the 6th World Atheist Congress, Vijayawada, India on 10 January 2007