Abigail:
"Religion has great benefits for a society and for individuals, even if there is no creator God."
And these are?
Well, where I live, there is about 70% atheists and 30% believers. I have a couple of believers as friends. From my experience, no, they are not better people than we are.
Grant:
"I'm not sure if this has been discussed here before, but how isn't atheism as religion? It has to be accepted on faith, because we can't prove there isn't a magical space god that created everything. I happen to have more faith in atheism than Christianity, but ultimately its still faith."
I also believe there isn't a 1000km wide pink doughnut orbiting Alpha Centauri. Is that a religion too?
BTW, "magical space god that created everything". How was HE created?
All that said, universe, its beginning, human mind and consciousness and self-awarnes, these all are very fascinating mysteries and "God" is a very tempting and easy answer. But it is pretty much likely wrong.
At tonight's Thanksgiving, Erin remarked on how this was her first real Thanksgiving dinner away from her family, and that it was an odd feeling to just sit down and eat without any prayer beforehand. (Yes, she's a solid atheist in no danger whatsoever, thank you for asking.)
And as she said this, it reminded me of how wrong it is to give gratitude to God for blessings that actually come from our fellow human beings putting in a great deal of work.
So I at once put my hands together and said,
"Dear Global Economy, we thank thee for thy economies of scale, thy professional specialization, and thy international networks of trade under Ricardo's Law of Comparative Advantage, without which we would all starve to death while trying to assemble the ingredients for such a dinner as this. Amen."