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By Jim Downard
Why do most atheists ask annoyingly hard questions like, ‘if God created man then who created God?,’ the moment someone reveals that they’re Christian?

None of that data goes away regardless of whether any gods were involved in our origins. But the second packed matter concerns why the focus on just Christians? Of course our culture is predominately Christian, so that frame is the common one encountered. But religious explanations for human origins stall across the board. All extant religions are comparatively recent (barely a few thousand years) and so are far removed from any active traditions handed down over the hundreds of thousands of years since our species split off from the Homo erectus kin in Africa. It simply wasn’t in the historic mythical frame to recall enough data to arrive at a reliable accounting of how our species got here. Congenial tales were made up, which differed across the globe depending on what things were of paramount concern. But none of them imagined populations of hominids generating a new form by allopatric means (geographical spread and differentiation), let alone which among them would end up liking leafy green salads with broccoli.
To the extent that religious discussions of god(s) act as placeholders for an explanation, rather than an explanation itself, skeptics are going to inquire where the origins game stops. Who created “God” (and just the one?) inevitably among them.
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