Neapolitan

We are all human beings and whether you believe in God or not you still going to have fear. When the alarm goes off in the morning people drag themselves out of bed for the fear of being late for school or work. Most people do well or just get by at school because of the fear of failing. Is there no fear of writing a paper that will not pass peer review? I wonder how much fear can contribute in academic achievement as well.

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Guybrush

Fear of not passing peer review or getting horrible grades are rational fears. But I would argue that a fear of being reprimanded or punished by God for saying that he/she/it doesn't exist is an irrational fear.

edit :

The interesting thing here, I would argue, is that we are all influenced by irrational fears, even those of us who consider ourselves skeptics. Perhaps not a fear of God, but most of us will at some point behave in certain "ritualistic" ways depending on the situation. Aside from the test, other simple examples of irrational behaviour could be gambling when we "feel" that we have a bigger chance of winning than we actually do even if we rationally know our chances or it could be a football player doing some sort of ritual like kissing the ball before trying to score a goal on a penalty kick, hoping that the ritual would add to his or her chances of scoring.

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Something Completely Different