Shit happens and then you die. Just because reality is tough doesn't mean one can escape from it using fantasy. There is no nutrition in fantasy, if it is all you consume, you will die of starvation.

@EdEarl True, you also need alcohol and drugs.

@Sticks48 Some people need medical drugs. However, I don't need street drugs. I have a drink occasionally, and I have been known to party hard, but those aren't needs IMO.

@EdEarl Everyone's needs are different.

They are also both addictive.

Religious people live a fantasy life, which IMO is a delusion Someone deluded is sick. Aren't they?

@Amisja Not sure what you mean by, "Not always." I'd agree that if a delusion is based on bad information, and the person will correct their beliefs based on facts, it is not sickness. However, if a delusion persists in the face of facts, it is a sickness, IMO.

@EdEarl The reality is that medically if a large group of people share a mis-belief like god or that they will the lottery or whatever, it is not delusional.

@Amisja I know. However, many Christians think other people who believe in other religions are misguided, wrong, stupid, delusional, or something besides rational. And, many people of other religious reciprocate. That medically people who share a mis-belief are not considered delusional is a misdiagnosis, IMO. Medicine does recognize mass histeria. "According to an 1844 book citing an unnamed medical textbook, a nun in a French convent during an unspecified time in the Middle Ages inexplicably began to meow like a cat, shortly leading to the other nuns in the convent also meowing. Eventually all the nuns would meow together for a certain period every day, leaving the surrounding community astonished. This did not stop until the police threatened to whip the nuns."--Wikipedia How many people must do a thing for it to be not a sickness?

@EdEarl Mass hysteria is something very different and usually in response to a joint mass experience of high stress. Religion isn't.

@Amisja We have many people who believe the Earth is flat, that aliens from another planet visit the Earth, that crop circles are produced by aliens, that BIg Foot exists, and many other legends.

Moreover, there are religions that are no longer practiced that have become myths, such as Greek myths about gods and titans.

According to Wictionary "delusion" means: "A false belief that is resistant to confrontation with actual facts." Non of the definitions say anything about a delusion becoming accepted as fact because X number of people believe it.