Why religion is the lazy coward’s way

Summary: Religion is to science what snacking and TV-addiction is to exercise and deep work; a little bit like how technical analysis relates to fundamental analysis in investing.

Disclaimer: Before bashing on religion you should always ask what kind it is, i.e., exactly what the believer actually believes. When I’m talking about religion, I mean the existence of a personalized God that can and will communicate with people, governs some kind of extra-material realm, as well as can break or change the natural laws. All of that is of course complete bunk.


Religion is lazy, indulgent, and intellectually cowardly.

A scientist has to work much harder at uncovering the true nature of reality.

It takes centuries of missteps and breakthroughs, of courageous individuals and diligent teams challenging and building on each other’s findings, to chip away at the big marble block of nature, piece by piece revealing what’s beneath.

In contrast, any child can succumb to an overactive amygdala, and assume agency in every occurrence. God is a childish invention, where the familiarity of grown-ups controlling and creating the child’s world spills over into adulthood, infecting the mind with shortcut solutions to complex problems.


It’s the snack eating, TV-couch dwelling, dopamine addict personality that turns to God for a quick fix; whereas the curious and diligent homeostasis breaker works hard and deeply, knowing that the satisfaction from accomplishment beats any short term sugar rush.

You can tell your bible touting friend the next time you see him, that he’s nothing but a feeble-minded, childish addict that’s too lazy or too scared to try to understand the true nature of reality.


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22 thoughts on “Why religion is the lazy coward’s way”

  1. I’m surprised that a scientific person’s understanding of religion is as close-minded and uninformed as a fanatic religious person’s beliefs about science. Open you mind and try to understand the other side on a deeper level before you dismiss it entirely! There are great Christian and spiritual thinkers, just as there are great scientists and philosophers.

    1. Re: “understanding of religion is as close-minded and uninformed” and “try to understand the other side on a deeper level”
      Q1: Where should Mikael Syding or we start to “try to understand the other side on a deeper level”?
      Q2: What would make Mikael or anyone else, become more open-minded and informed?
      Q3: Would being open-minded and informed include or exclude “understanding” the:
      magical thinking,
      anthropomorphizing.
      supernaturalism,
      plethora of fallacious arguments (especially special pleadings),
      the massive irony and hypocrisy,
      cultish and divisive ingroup vs outgroup (otherizing),
      incestuous thought bubble groupthink,
      bias confirmation,
      cherry picking of ‘sacred’ text, |
      ignoring and excusing the God condoned and instructed: genocide, rape, infanticide, racism, slavery, genital mutilation, animal sacrificing, |
      schizophrenic dialogue with their God,
      terrorist threats used for recruiting and maintaining members of the eternal pain, violence, suffering, and separation for non-believers?

  2. jesus christ, calm the fuck down bro; you would not be living in this society if it wasn’t for religion which helps the masses to have a sense of morality & ever present thoughts of an all seeing eye.
    No wander you don’t have a girlfriend or kids.
    Instead of drinking your oil capsules for your brain, try some chill pills; at the end of the day no one cares, believe what they want to. You just show yourself as an ignoramus when you publish stupid subjective shit like this.

      1. He makes a good point about the “masses” needing religion as a moral compass and punishment threat for bad behavior. However, I believe humans will never be fully civilized until religion is crushed and forgotten. It makes them too susceptible to manipulation by authority figures.

        I see too many cases where scientists are stuck in poorly reasoned or obsolete beliefs. Religious thinking is too common in science and every other field.

    1. The all seeing eye which encourages people to steal women and children from other communities…to enslave non believers of your personal god?? No wonder colonialism and isis terrorism are done in the name of your god…

  3. The historical claims of some mystics, or gnostics, record a deep understanding of reality not available to the usual man. And, like the claims of quantum physicists, the usual man (like me) does not have the knowledge or tools required to verify whether or not those claims are true.
    Perhaps another way to look at this is that religion (or spirituality), like science, requires deep focus to master. Regardless of the veracity of any particular claims, there have been individuals who have devoted their entire lives to mastering each of these pursuits, and have made great sacrifices to do so. Also, maybe some people are born with a particular talent for each endeavor that, combined with hard work, produces extraordinary results.
    I think we are probably agreed though that there are too many people running around making claims in both fields without knowing what the hell they are talking about because they don’t have the talent or discipline to master those fields. And they indulge in magical thinking.

    1. Well put. I agree completely.

      I really only meant to say that unquestioning belief in a personal deity is a way of avoiding hard work to understand the physical reality

      1. Yep, entire agree about the damage of unquestioning belief. And I knew that was what you meant – just wanted to add my two cents.
        Thanks very much for commenting.

  4. I agree about the religious part, it’s a quick fix and I actually envy those who can stick to fairytales. But I don’t believe this has anything to do with dopamine-addiction, I actually think that dopamine kick-searching is what drives many scientists and intellectual people’s searching and work. I call it accomplishment junkies and information junkies, you know the people who can’t put aside a project or can’t stop searching for an answer, the ones who works 16 hours per day for a goal greater than money. I also think it’s unfair for the open mind of a child to be compared to a religious, the mind of a child is evolving and critical but in the same time open and borderless, not like the static mind of a person who has got stuck in a believing. I’m procrastinating right now and should get back to my bachelor thesis… have a nice evening!

    1. Well put Jesseca. I agree.
      Also the religious aspects are so integrated with culture and upbringing so even if people actually agree with the original post they might instinctively respond defensively as it can be perceived to attack their past (foundation)

    2. Cool and deep comment. Thank you for that. I agree on both the dopamine and child comments. However, what I meant was the quick fix part, the sugar addiction parallel, not the kick searching per se. As for the child’s mind comparison, my focus was on the immaturity and lack of self-control, not the open and borderless. I think we’re on the same page really.

  5. You defined what you mean by religion, but you didn’t clearly define what you mean by science.

    Would you be so kind as to define ‘science’?

    I am asking because I personally don’t see why you assume science and religion to be mutually exclusive. I’ve met great, accurate, scientific thinkers who were also men of faith.

  6. This person is speaking the truth. God is just a lazy way of understanding the world. It’s saying I don’t believe I can understand the world around me so I’m going to give it over to a higher power to understand for me. God is the bane of human intellectualism and ingenuity. It’s similar to never exploring more than 10 miles from the place you were born.

  7. Don’t know if I should laugh or cry after reading this post :)
    Mikael, and other Swedish readers, please read this an maybe get some insight in a Christian worldview: http://apologiaforlag.se/books/gudsdodgravare/PDF/guds_dodgravare_kap1.pdf

    Extract: “Till grund för all vetenskap ligger övertygelsen om att universum är
    välordnat. Utan denna djupa övertygelse skulle det inte finnas någon
    vetenskap. Därför är frågan varifrån denna övertygelse kommer fullt
    berättigad. För amerikanen Melvin Calvin, nobelpristagare i biokemi,
    tycks det inte råda något tvivel om dess härkomst: ”När jag försöker
    urskilja upphovet till denna övertygelse, tycks den gå tillbaka till en
    grundtanke som upptäcktes för två-tre tusen år sedan och först formulerades
    i västvärlden av de gamla hebréerna. Denna grundtanke
    var att universum styrs av en ensam Gud och inte är en produkt av en
    massa nyckfulla gudar som var för sig styr sin egen provins i enlighet
    med sina lagar. Detta monoteistiska synsätt tycks utgöra den historiska
    grunden för modern vetenskap.”1”

  8. I totally agree. However, I would also add that religion serves as a conduit for control freaks, which is in and of itself another whole psyche. Some of them find solace in leading others into their belief systems, thus affirming their fate based on fear. Whereas others are simply feeding their egos, which is the height of pride and hypocrisy.

  9. Religion is basically still a group of cavemen worshiping a rock based on what another caveman says.

  10. I googled this phrase “Religion is just lazy philosophy” to find out who said and I ended up here. I’ll weigh in here. How many you strongly support science only because it makes sense to you and it is backed up by facts that you can look up on Google because it has been documented? How many dismiss possible theories just it doesn’t make sense to your logical mind? Keep in mind a lot of the technology we use today was considered magic less than 200 yrs ago. Now, how many of you believe what you believe just because, an authority figure told you so? Religion is a “belief” system handed down through generations. How many factions of Christianity are there?Why are there so many? In 400 yrs 2+2 will still equal 4. Belief systems that do not or will not evolve to allow for growth are like a cancer. Quantum physics is still making us ask more questions. There is room for magic and there always will be. Unfortunately, there will always be those who prefer to forego responsibility to get absolute answers . . .

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