What Is The Point Of Prayer?

[Esquilax]

I may as well ask you to provide evidence that the universe exploded out of nothing at all for no reason and randomly happened to be 100% structured for the formation of life over an intricate process involving billions of years of stellar and galactic evolution was through an incredible blind coincidence.

Isn't it good, then, that you didn't ask that, and display a staggering ignorance, not only of the big bang theory but also the burden of proof and the position of most atheists. Isn't it fortuitous that I don't have to sit here now and explain to you that your description of the big bang there is an idiotic and previously refuted strawman, and that the actual big bang theory doesn't involve an explosion for no reason. Aren't you happy that I don't have to remind you that, of the two of us, it is the creationist account of life that involves something coming from nothing for no reason, not the big bang theory? Doesn't it save time for me not to have to point out to you that the majority of the universe isn't structured for life, that the parts of it that are aren't ideal for it, and that your meaningless anthropomorphization of the formation of the universe is ineffective as an argument because it's only even an issue if we take a designer as read; it's defining a problem into existence, and without a designer there is also no design, and thus the chances of something happening the way it did are moot.

Isn't it nice that I don't have to waste my time posting this evidence for the big bang? And isn't it equally nice that I don't have to remind you that what I just posted is real evidence and not just a series of assertions, like your position has been so far?

Wow, you would look really bad if I had to do all that...

I may as well ask you to provide evidence that you're nothing but a series of chemical reactions with no independent freewill of your own.

Again, it's lucky you didn't! Because you would just look like a fucking dumbass if you did, given that this isn't an atheist position, and I'd have to remind you that the burden of proof lies on you, if you want to claim that there's something more than that.

But you know all this atheism stuff is actually baloney anyway.

Oh, well, I was going with humorous obfuscations until now, but seriously, if you're genuinely broaching this point, go fuck yourself.

The topic was about how prayer works not whether God exists. If God didn't exist then what do you think prayer is and why do people do it?

Because they're wrong. The existence of prayer doesn't mean prayer works, or do you say the same of not allowing black cats to cross your path?

Is there a good evolutionary purpose behind it?

No, because prayer is a sociological phenomenon. If you wanted the evolutionary purpose behind fostering the kinds of beliefs that would lead to religion I could make a case, though.