“the psychological concepts…can also…be used to explain their unbelief.” This is a bit like explaining an unbirthday, in true Mad Hatter style. The onus of proof lies on those who want to believe in something, not in those who don’t. If I started trying to explain someone's unbelief in unicorns as a means of justifying my belief in them I would rightly be laughed at.

A better investigation in this topic would be how many believers believe because their fathers told them from an early age that they had to believe. This would explain why, in an of greater religiosity, those who didn’t have fathers or didn’t communicate well with them didn’t believe – they didn’t have it rammed down their throat by their fathers from an early age.

Face it, no one knows for sure.Could this be away of testing our courage and tenacity?There could be a god,but the bad news could be that we will not have a consciousness beyond our mortal limitations.

I suspect life after death,is like life before death.I'm just having problems with my memory, pre-birth and pre-conception.

The ideas of this book go some way to confirm the belief that religion is best viewed as virus of the mind (like Dawkins’ meme theory). It is a form of mental ‘programming’ which spreads through minds via culture and language. The easiest way for this to happen is from a father to his son, since as we know sons mimic their fathers – provided the relationship is healthy. If Sartre had a religious father, then “thank god” the relationship was bad – otherwise he may have absorbed the belief in fairies.

Face what, Arjay? That there might be a god, or there might be unicorns, or both? There is an equal amount of evidence for both.

Should I write a book explaining why some people don’t believe in unicorns, and then have these ideas discussed on a national forum?

As a Atheist I always find it amusing that Christians always fall into the same trap.
Either their right or the atheist are they seem to forget that there are many other religions out there. Atheist hold the opinion that there is no supernatural forces. Christians not only not believe this they also believe they know it nature. As with most things faith based it’s a straw man easy to set a light.

Kennyyyyy....I'm sending you back to primary school brudder to learn some basic grammer.. I struggggle to make sense of some stuff you say, I'm afraid this time is a classic. So, its difficult to know how to respond to you.

But I don't find it difficult to see a connection between the intensity of disbelief and a poor father son relationship. I don't see that in the article this was proposed as any kind of universal "If u have a bad father you will be an atheist" kind of thing, but he was pointing out that a considerable number of influential thinkers DID have that experiential background.

GREG... 'virus of the mind' ? well, Paul suggests we need to be 'transformed by the renewal of your minds' but his appeal is based on some very down to earth facts about Christ. I will agree with one thing, to have a 'Christian' mindset is totally DIFFerent from having a secular one.
You can probably not appreciate this until you encounter situations like the young mentally troubled chap who took his life after killing the policement with his own handgun. I knew that young man and know his parents, and while there is little one can do about mental illness such as Mark Bailey had, the aftermath of such tragedies can be handled in totally different ways than the normally expected gloom and doom which most people would be subjected to.