I think the reason is that while science gives knowledge, religion gives meaning.

They're still raised by the same duped parents and grandparents. It's a vicious circle. ... and when it's time to think for themselves, they become confused.

Because people are stupid. And parents drill relgion into their children and its very hard to escape it

Well "how can they" may not be as important as "will they anyway," and believe it or not this is all in the Bible in code, the "priest" breaks up Nehushtan, or ritual worship. God hates religion as much as you do ok

Science hasn't proven whether god exists or not. When people talk about god they are usually talking about one of two different concepts.
The God of the universe, or the local God that supposedly interacts with peoples lives, rewards and punishes, talks to people, cares about the sex lives of humans, and likes to write books are the two.

To me God/Goddess/Gods is the air I breath. The trees in a forest. The sun and the moon. The food I eat. The water I drink.

It depends on how you view God.

Because belief and faith have no association with reason and for some, reason is an emotional flatland. Depth doesn’t come out of reason. Depth comes from asking ‘what if’. It doesn’t require gods but for many gods will do the trick.

I think it is because the young a brainwashed and they belief what the adults tell them, something like the god virus, a god meme. I know that book was written, do not remember the author

Well, from my experience as a child and son of a deacon in the church: What you are taught and have hammered into your brain on a daily basis becomes your version of "reality," even if it feels wrong to you. A child's mind is so malleable, coupled with the idea that your parents "know everything" when you're little, you are subconsciously brainwashed from the start. I was lucky enough to meet friends and a particular professor in college who welcomed my questioning of the bible and offered input and recommended readings to free my mind. Upon realizing the errors in the bible the blinders came off. Sadly, not many people are willing to even explore the concept (or maybe incapable) of thinking otherwise bc the religious trauma runs so deep that their critical thinking skills become nonexistent.

Because easy answers was only one small part of the reasons people believe in gods. There is also the emotional coddling.
I don't think being religious makes someone a racist, but it has never surprised me that the more notorious hate-groups in America are (a version of) Christians. Why? Because the center piece of monotheistic teachings is that there will be a separation of the sheep and the goats. The superior will be elevated and the unworthy will burn.

If you're a useless idiot with delusions of grandeur, god is the quick n' easy key to your supremacy; a lifetime of ego-boosting bullshit that reality can't touch.

Perhaps it's a coincidence. It is my two cents, anyway.

The use of "God" has changed for modern people into not just an explanation for the unknown, or in many cases I think the I do not want to know so God did it. Rather it or she or he has become a tool for social power and a sense of place in a world increasingly polarized between the rich and everyone else and those who want to know even if the knowing hurts or is scary. Versus those (the majority I think) who want to believe far more then they want to know. Ironically the Internet and its access to information simply allows people to pick and choose facts as well as bend and alter them to fit a narrative. Also I feel there is a lot of backlash to knowledge. It is not just religion that is the problem I feel with nationalistic movements and any group that seeks the demonization of others as a tool to power or purpose also part of the dynamic which is and always has torn apart the world. Add in racial and gender identity to the mix. We as a species need two things; reason based governance and identifying all humans as equal irrelevant to any thing intrinsic to their identity and physical/neurological nature that does not directly harm others.

A lot of people still believe in gods in a cultural sense, but there are far fewer people who really believe the mythology now, and those tend to be in pockets of (usually willful) ignorance. Modern man is still capable of believing some pretty ridiculous things (bigfoot, aliens, Trekkies, etc), only now it requires willful ignorance.

I think it just goes down from generation to generation. Possibly the biggest ongoing scam in modern history

To feel part of a group makes us humans. We are social creatures for the most part and want to join together with each other however right or wrong it may be. My old college professor used to say "misery loves company" and I find that true in many cases. Belonging to a religion makes many people feel like they are doing the "right" thing. If one sheep falls off the edge of a cliff all the others follow. However, more and more people are realizing the truth about religion as science is punching many holes into it. Too bad I won't be around in a couple of hundred years to see if atheism is the norm and religion takes a back seat in the world. Wouldn't that be a laugh?

As a soldier in Irak, while in dangerous situations, I felt the need to pray to be able to sleep. It gave me confident to carry on.

From what I've seen there are several reasons. There are simple-minded people who are gullible enough swallow this nonsense, there are people like myself who were indoctrinated as a child, but as they grew older and became educated realized that there is no truth in religion. I recently talked somebody who admitted he knew there was no gods but believed just because he wanted believe. Still others who believe because they fell into the scare tactics I believe in God because I don't want to go to hell for all eternity.and then there's the people at the top of the game people running the masses, mind control, manipulate you out of for their own personal gains. Every year religion rakes in billions of dollars tax-, safe say all that is not going an invisible genie in The sky.

From what I've seen there are several reasons. There are simple-minded people who are gullible enough swallow this nonsense, there are people like myself who were indoctrinated as a child, but as they grew older and became educated realized that there is no truth in religion. I recently talked somebody who admitted he knew there was no gods but believed just because he wanted believe. Still others who believe because they fell into the scare tactics I believe in God because I don't want to go to hell for all eternity.and then there's the people at the top of the game people running the masses, mind control, manipulate you out of for their own personal gains. Every year religion rakes in billions of dollars tax-, safe say all that is not going an invisible genie in The sky.

Have read some reasonable comments here and I do believe there is not one reason but many. One that I did not see mentioned though, and I consider near the top of the list is POWER. I think people need to feel they have some power over their world and if you can work with the, and get help from, a supreme power of the universe they have power.

I think there are many reasons. The big one is fear. It's one thing be a rabbit running from a wolf because you have an instinctual urge avoid danger, and its another thing be able sit down, have a conference with people and discuss the risks and dangers involved with any given task. Reasoning and rationality is a double edged sword. We evolved this amazing tool that allows us to problem solve, predict, and imagine, while at the same time it causes us to solve problems that aren't real, predict events that may never happen, and imagine anything and everything. Our brains are now a mixed mess of prehistoric instinctual urges and faulty logical methodologies that only work when there is a small amount of information involved. Like Skepticguy pointed out, politics is almost completely parallel to religion, but religion is unique in that it can be immune to scrutiny with enough motivated reasoning and cognitive ignorance. Religions will come and go, or change and evolve, but religion will be apart of the human experience for a very, very long time.

Many people do not have the mental capacity to understand science or the world around them and so they use the same ways to explain the world as the earliest societies (animism and totemism), also they may not be able to deal with the idea that they are responsible for their own actions and the preservation of our home.

This ignorance (often by choice) needs the support of a group and so religion and it's soothing ideology gives them a support group. The irony of this of course is that most of these people cannot even follow religious teachings correctly either, no Christian who read the bible could possibly believe in no healthcare, education, food or homes for the poor, in war and hatred or bigotry. The same for jihadists and other fundamentalists. So the odds are most religious people don't believe in god, if they did there would be no war, famine or unnecessary suffering as they would want to be in the good books when they bite the big biscuit. Longer answer than expected!!!

The question is why does an enlightened nation pick myths belonging to another nation who copied them from older nations, who copied them .... Why those? Why not any other one or 20 myths from elsewhere?

Pretending to understand and force rules on "god" is not the same as believing in the possibility of a spiritual realm that exists beyond the earthly realm. The University of Virgina has done a great deal of research into reincarnation with scientific responsibility, if not at a laboratory level.

They've been intentionally crippled since birth.

Because they are weak-minded people