One data observation within science, that is overlooked is, religious behavior is a behavior that is unique to humans. Animals do not display religious behavior, but rely on instinct and sensory data sort of like the atheists.
Relative to evolution, when religious behavior appears, a new behavior that was unique also appeared in nature. Religion was an important part of early civilization, because this unique human behavior created selective advantage.
You're mistaking correlation for causation.
Humans have religion and animals don't because humans have sufficient intelligence to be self aware and to have the concept of 'minds' and be aware of the existence of minds/intelligences other than our own. From this is it possible for us to anthropomorphise things and assign attributes we associate to our minds to other phenomena in nature. For instance, people who are angry at one another might harm one another and when the ground shakes and people get hurt (ie an earthquake) then early man might have thought there was intent, a concept associated to an intelligence, behind that harm done to the community.
We developed sufficient intelligence to develop technology, language, agriculture, communities etc and it is
that which has lead to an evolutionary advantage. However, along with that we have also gained the tools to conceive of things which don't exist, ie an imagination. Part of our intelligence comes from pattern recognition and being able to guess things and if we see patterns which don't exist and use our imaginations we could arrive at notions similar to religion, explaining things we see as work of some other intelligence.
Another important thing which is evolutionarily important is accepting what we're told as kids. If we're told "Don't run into the road" as a kid and we ignore it we're more likely to be hit by a car. As a child taking things on faith is an important thing. Unfortunately we then carry with us some of the things we are taught as kids into adulthood and some people never stop to question what they took on faith as a child.
Religion isn't an evolutionary advantage, it is hijacking for its own purposes behaviours and tools evolution has provided us.
It is possible that the atheist may lack the genes for this evolutionary change and therefore completely misunderstand it. If they did lack the genetic basis for this, it would make sense, they would prefer a modified version of the animal standard, since animals also lacks this unique human behavior.
Well done on demonstrating you are yet another example of a religious person who doesn't grasp evolution. As has already been pointed out, how can someone's choice of to their religious beliefs (or lack of) be genetic? When someone converts from Christianity to Islam does their DNA change? Of course not! And religious belief is not genetic. It is passed down through families because parents teach their kids what they believe but that is nurture, not nature.
The fact you talk about others misunderstanding evolutionary change when you
utterly fail to understand evolution and how religion develops and is passed on in a culture is all the more ironic.
The main point is evolution is about change and selective advantage. Religious behavior is a behavior that is unique to humans and is very ancient and compelling to some, therefore a natural part of a branch of human evolution.
Your conclusion does not follow from the assumptions. Religion may well be a facet of human civilisation which cannot be removed, for the reasons I outlined above, but that doesn't mean it is a positive thing in general. A challenge Christopher Hitchins gives to many theists is to provide an example of a real demonstrable benefit of religion which
cannot be obtained through secular means. There isn't one. Benefits religion might give which lead to a group having improved chances of survival might include prompting people to share resources or to help ill members of the group but those things are done in secular communities too.
Now we are moving into a more and more technology dependent society as a whole the ardent anti-science mindset many religions try to entrench into their followers will
not be an evolutionary advantage as time goes on. For instance, science provides us with the means to feed billions of people and protect them from many illnesses via vaccinations and from water borne disease via water treatment. Billions living now depend on science, you can't sustain 7 billion people using Bronze Age methods.
The anti-evolutionary crap spouted by many Christians and Muslims (to name but two examples) attempts to retard our understanding of biology and biotechnology is essential to our future.
The Islamic world used to be the pinnacle of scientific development (1100ish), while Europe was deep in the Dark Ages. Then Europe emerged from the era of being dominated by religion and the Arabic world went much more extreme. Since then the Arabic world has declined enormously in scientific development. More research is done by Harvard or Cambridge than entire Middle East countries.
Why is it so many religions love saying how their god made us in his image and gave us a mind so we could appreciate his work and yet they then tell us not to use that mind to examine the universe around us?
