Do you think that one day religion will become a thing of the past

[Amine]

Neither of us will live to see it.

Dunno about you, but I'll be 80 in 2065. Assuming life expectancy inexplicably stagnates over the next 50 years (that would be hilarious), that still gives me what I consider to be a staggering amount of time and change to see. Look what happened socially from 1915 to 1965. Yeah..........

Also, just how long do you think it is going to take even the developing world to get the sort of connectivity we have right now in the West? Africa isn't even that far behind in smartphones, for example.

It's uncertain, sure. This planet has a whole lot of religious nuts. But 50 years is a really long time these days, and the old ones are dying off every day. Changes in culture can happen really fast.

[Aoi Magi]

1) Nope, organized large scale religion might end but religion and woo won't end because it is a byproduct of our natural curiosity and ignorance of the unknown. So as long as there are unknowns, there is room for woo and religion.

2) Religion actually did a lot for science. It is like a villain who causes the hero to grow stronger. If it didn't exist, I doubt science would make this much progress. However I also believe without religion, our society would be a lot better and certainly lot less bigoted.

[Reforged]

Human beings will always pursue ways to feel self-important and the ones who enable this quality the most will live long, happy lives and pass on their genes at the expense of their followers and society ingeneral. This leads me to suspect religion will fade around the same time as the flickering embers of our existence do the same.
If you're looking for a just universe try World of Warcraft or something.

[TheoneandonlytrueGod]

Religions will probably never die out however if my reading of the history of the world is correct xanity will fade away as have so called pagan religions of the past to be replaced with another religion and xanity will become myth just as other religions or beliefs have.

We still have pagan religions around, there are still people who practice polytheistic, Voodoo, wiccan and many other religious practices.

So religions won't go. There seems to be a human need to account for the vagaries of life and mostly logic and science just won't help.

[God of Mr. Hanky]

Seems like religion is only used to control people, like large amounts of people. Now it seems like religious institutions are barley hanging onto that last little bit of power and influence they have. Basically, do you think that there will be a time when things like Christianity and Islam will be looked at like how we view Greek Gods now? Just kind of a way to explain things, but aren't scientifically true. 

Also....what do you think the world would be like if religion has never existed?

On the Greek gods, they faded rather quickly with the rise of monotheism, which became globalized after millennia of being relegated to Israel, and the range of the Jewish people within the Eastern Mediterranean (not counting the somewhat obscure Zoroaster). Xtians and Muslims went where no pantheon had gone before: Instead of presenting the world a god who loves the kings and the powerful, they became the first to give the common poor people and slaves a god which cares about them. This forced rulers to put on a show of humility before their god if they wanted to keep their position and their heads, but they did not resist because they knew the ideas of that god were a more effective way of controlling the hordes than the old gods could offer. Needless to say, this added a whole new wrinkle to the hypocrisy of religion in high places! While there are more poor people than there are rich, I doubt anyone will succeed at putting that genie back in its bottle - we can at best hope for a general decline in the rate of religiosity and a rise in critical reasoning as the better approach to solving life's problems, and for the improvement of society.

[Excited Penguin]

Just wait a few years. Christianity will disappear overnight, and Islam will go very fast too, but also bloody - which is a bad thing, but inevitable too.

[Excited Penguin]

People are not as dumb as a lot of my fellow atheists give them credit for. A lot of them are just understadably confused and didn't even think these things through(the believers, I mean).

[paulpablo]

Seems like religion is only used to control people, like large amounts of people. Now it seems like religious institutions are barley hanging onto that last little bit of power and influence they have. Basically, do you think that there will be a time when things like Christianity and Islam will be looked at like how we view Greek Gods now? Just kind of a way to explain things, but aren't scientifically true. 

Also....what do you think the world would be like if religion has never existed?

There seems to be 3 different questions here.

1) Will religion be a thing of the past.  Probably not.

2) Will Islam and Christianity be religions of the past one day.    It's likely.

3) If religion had never existed.  Too many variables to consider.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

Seems like religion is only used to control people, like large amounts of people. Now it seems like religious institutions are barley hanging onto that last little bit of power and influence they have. Basically, do you think that there will be a time when things like Christianity and Islam will be looked at like how we view Greek Gods now? Just kind of a way to explain things, but aren't scientifically true. 

Also....what do you think the world would be like if religion has never existed?

The first thing to understand is the reason for religion.  What is the primary reason for all religions?

The primary reason for all religions is to brainwash the population into complete belief and obedience through a common BS fairytale.  It really doesn't matter what the BS fairy tale is about as long as it promises a good reward for obeying and a bad punishment for disobedience.  

In most societies the priest class, the merchants of the BS, get special privileges from the head nabob as long as they keep the local yokels properly indoctrinated in believing that he is the hand-picked minion of the particular imaginary deity they like to yak about.  

In religious free societies they elevate the ruler to become their "god".  

The mainline religions will die out when we experience a global disaster that destroys current societies.  The power hungry survivors will then create new BS fairytales to indoctrinate the scared yokels into complete belief and obedience so that the group can function as a cohesive unit.  People need BS fairy tales to give them purpose and direction.  

Imagine the chaos if everyone in the world today did whatever he wanted to do whenever he wanted to do it.  Humans are the ultimate herd animal because we are incapable of surviving without the help of others.  We are not cockroaches.  

Religions will always exist because they are very effective in brainwashing humans to believe and to obey without exception.

[Exian]

If something could be done about extremist ideologies from any religion and fundamentalists poking their noses into schools and politics, I could give a rats ass what they do. If every religious person was a cherry picking theists, the world would get along a little bit better.