What is the best counter argument against "What do you lose by believing?"

[Jackalope]

Belief doesn’t simply have an on/off switch. I can no more start believing in God than I can stop believing in France (not for lack of trying).

I’m sure a fix ‘feels right’ to a heroin addict, it doesn’t mean heroin is good for him.

Boru

This.

I have a good friend in our adopted home who is an ex-pastor, and quite the Jesus freak in the good way (I.e. we share a lot of the same values).. I just tell him I can't believe what I don't through force of will, I'm not wired that way, and we get along fine. He doesn't value logic or arguments so he's immune to them and that's OK. Neither one of us is going to convince the other.

[Rev. Rye]

When people tell me this I reply y saying "what god?" as there are many. I wonder if there is a better argument.

Also what do you say when people say they believe because they "feel God", so it is the "right religion"?

1) Which god, what variation, and how fervently? Because the answer to that question could vary significantly depending on what the answer is. Maybe spending an hour a week bored out of your mind in uncomfortable and expensive clothes on the low end, maybe getting wrapped up in a toxic belief system that alienates you from the modern world and likely eventually your family on the high end. Or perhaps, if you’re particularly unlucky, you get killed, although, outside of the snake handlers, you tend to not notice this is going to happen until you’re already in too deep.

2) It’s just a more nebulous argument from personal experience. You have a feeling? What the fuck am I supposed to do with that, especially if I don’t share that feeling?

[HappySkeptic]

There is a lot to lose by believing in a god (depending on the god)

For the Christian God, if the writings were Truth, then this world is a failed experiment that now serves only as a test of faith. It has no value at all. Only the infinite time in heaven has value.

This affects morality, values, purpose, and happiness -- and not in a good way.

[Angrboda]

I think when this question is raised, bringing up that 44 people were trampled to death in a religious festival as a direct consequence of belief might be useful.

[The Grand Nudger]

When people tell me that they feel god, I suggest that every human being feels what they're feeling.

[GUBU]

When people tell me this I reply y saying "what god?" as there are many. I wonder if there is a better argument.

Also what do you say when people say they believe because they "feel God", so it is the "right religion"?

What do you gain? If its christianity, the only answer is fear.

[purplepurpose]

2 Peter 2:4 For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them deep into hell, placing them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment;

God is the ultimate tyrant. Life in constant fear of failing your Lord. There is much to lose in such life.

[polymath257]

self-honesty.

[Gwaithmir]

Religious belief robs you of your intellectual integrity. 

[Duty]

The blissful absence of the terror of eternal damnation. I has win the thread!