The majority of the most popular religions in the world are dependent on the belief that there is a god that created and is now ruling over humanity. You can’t have the rest without believing in that first.

So, what would happen if one day we could prove god didn’t exist?

These 14 people are fleshing out their thoughts on just that!

1. Flawed question.

This is a deeply flawed question, and I say this as a committed atheist; this question doesn’t understand proof or the scientific method, which is to say the best methodology we have for “proving” anything.

Proof doesn’t really exist in science, not “definitive” or “incontrovertible”, anyways. Quantum mechanics as a theory is more tested, literally, than sunrise. We have more experimental confirmation for that bit of math than we do the probability that the sunrise will occur as expect tomorrow and thereafter.

It’s still a theory. There’s still the possibility, however small, that it’s entirely wrong and there’s a whole different set of math that better explains it and it’s just a wild and unfathomable coincidence that it’s looked accurate thus far.

More importantly though, science doesn’t disprove anything, it doesn’t prove anything’s non-existence. If you’re looking for a purely scientific answer to “do unicorns exist”, the only acceptable answer is “not in any of the places we’ve looked” and, tentatively, “I don’t think so” and that’s it. That we have not discovered any evidence for unicorns is not proof, or even evidence, that there is no evidence for unicorns.

We will never, ever disprove the existence of god. By any reasonable standard of proof, you just can’t. You can’t prove dinosaurs aren’t all hiding in the lesser explored parts of one of the Dakotas, you can’t prove there’s no flying spaghetti monster, and you can’t prove God isn’t real. All you can do is attack the evidence that he is, and even when / if / should you prove it’s all bad, none of it stands up to scrutiny, that still leaves us at “no evidence”, which isn’t the same as “evidence against”.

2. Wouldn’t matter.

I don’t think anything would happen because it was proved that the Earth is round and there are still a lot of people that think it’s flat.

3. Same old…

“I don’t think anyone who genuinely believes in God would change their opinion even with some definitive proof.

Religion is already based on having faith in something that you can’t technically prove exists.

I don’t think the vast majority of religious peoples lives wouldn’t change.

4. Still living the good life.

As a Christian pastor a lot would change for me, but I doubt my approach to life and relationships would change.

Love, kindness, mutual self-sacrifice and generosity have proven themselves to me as a better way of living.

5. Hmmm…

This is a bait post to farm karma from atheists and farm comments from theists.

6. Thought experiment.

It is only a theoretical thought experiment, largely because in order to definitively prove the nonexistence of a concept like God, you would need the sort of magic/appeal to mystery that would tend to prove the existing of something like God.

Proving the empirical nonexistence of something is really hard to do. Which is why we put burdens of proof on proponents, and adopt the axiom that we only accept propositions for which there is supporting evidence.

7. Utopia!

South Park had a great episode a long time ago about what would happen if all religion disappeared.

The kids think the world will be a utopia now, only to find out people are now warring over which atheists are the true atheists

8. You must be God…

To prove there is no God, you have to be able to know of every point in the universe at the same time to know there is no God, which is omnipotence.

Which makes you a God. To know God does not exist you must be God.

9. No logic.

You can’t use logic to change someone’s belief when they didn’t use logic to come to that belief.

10. NOPE.

Zero.

People will believe what they want and facts won’t change that….

11. Not about God.

What would happen if God was definitively proven to be real? Mankind would crucify Him.

Because religion isn’t really about God. Maybe it was when it was new but before long people just use it as an excuse to hold power over people.

12. Mix it up.

Since everyone is saying Nothing, I will mix it up.

Proof of God’s non-existence would be followed by an intensive effort to invent Him.

Too much temporal power is involved for them to just pack up and move on.

13. Refund, please!

A lot of folks would want their money back.

14. Controversial.

“Definitively proven” would be a matter of endless controversy.

God himself would have to appear and declare himself not real. That’s the only way people will believe it.