The issue of god or no god is a controversial topic in today's world. Some of us believe that god exists, and mock those who believe otherwise, some of us believe that god doesn't exist, and mock those who say he does, and some of us who dislike the argument, are agnostic. Normally within these arguments after 5 minutes of intellectual discussion, the atheists say, "where did god come from?" and the religious people say "where did matter come from?", not necessarily in that order. It's a sad end to what could otherwise be a fruitful discussion.
The best way to look at religion sociologically, i.e., how society affects religion is by looking at how religion has evolved over time, alongside breakthroughs in science/knowledge in general. The earliest religions-paganism, and hinduism, tried to fill gaps in people's knowledge. They had sun gods which determined the rise of the sun, and at what time it occurred, the moon god, which determined whether or not the moon came up, and gods for other things, such as rain, and wind, and so on. As scientists began to explain those things, it then evolved to one god who created the world 6,000 years ago, and created species, and created the universe. Later on, as we discovered the big bang, and that the earth is 4.6 billion years old, and now religion has started disputing evolution, and asking physicists about the origin of matter.
If you look at it, religion only claims to explain what human beings don't fully understand at the time. It exploits gaps in people's knowledge, and finds false correlation between events. If religion says something to the effect of "pray, or the world will end tomorrow", and you pray, and the world doesn't end tomorrow, it is seen as a religious victory. However there is no evidence to support the fact that the praying itself made the world not end, there is no proof that not praying would have made the world end.
Eventually as time progresses, almost everything scientific will be explained, so religion will only explain what, by definiton can't be explained. One of the only things which can't be explained by definition is the outcome of random events in the short run. For example, if I flip a coin, what determines whether it lands on heads or tails? I have heard various bizarre theories, from the force that you put on it affecting the outcome (most plausible), to the amount you bet on the coinflip affecting the outcome. In the long run, we know that close to 50% will be heads, and 50% will be tails, but in the short run (1 flip), it's either heads or tails. There are too many factors which actually effect the flip, such as air density, wind, the way you flip the coin, velocity of the flip, angle of the flip, angular frequency, viabration of your hand/the coin etc. It is effectively unexplainable. Eventually society will use this to justify the existence of god. They will start to worship a god of heads, and a god of tails. Perhaps it won't be that extreme, but it'll be a god of luck.
When you point out that the existence of god can't be proven to a religious person, they tell you that it can't be disproven either. Frankly, that's a ridiculous answer. If I told you that there was an invisible monster in my closet that you can't see, but that you need faith to believe in, you would ask me to prove it, not disprove it. As occam's razor states, the simplest and most logical explanation should be assumed until a more complex one can be proven. Frankly, the universe being run by the laws of physics is simpler than the idea of an all knowing being in the sky controlling our fate, and destiny, knowing our thoughts, knowing our behaviour, and judging us based on our actions. The burden of proof is on the side of believers. "Faith" is not an argument. If you ask someone why something happens and they say "I believe it regardless of logic", by definition, they are illogical. Despite the burden of proof being on religion, each major religion can be disproven.
Hinduism: 1) Hinduism makes claims such as eclipses are caused by a stomachless god eating the sun, and the sun coming out of him because he lacks a stomach. We know that this isn't why eclipses happen.
2) Hinduism has stories like the Mahabharata which claims that Drona killed 10,000 people a day with a bow and arrow. Let's assume that it takes 2 arrows to kill a person (very optimistic), lets also assume that he hit his target with 60% of his shots (also very optimistic), and that he shot 12 arrows per minute (one of the fastest rates ever recorded despite his obsolete bow). They fought in summer, so the days were about 15 hours long, which is 900 minutes. It took drona 3.33 shots to kill a person. That means he got 3.6 kills/minute. That would give us a total of 3240 kills. This assumes that he took no time to reload/he never ran out of arrows/he always had multiple targets. The actual number was probably much lower than that. Of course, this assumes that this actually happened, which it did not.
Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism: reincarnation- reincarnation has to be false. It assumes that the species your soul becomes is based on behaviour in your previous life. Very noble, but unfortunately false. Firstly, most sources on reincarnation believe that souls can't be created or destroyed, which means that the number of living things on the planet must be constant. Firstly, we know that that isn't true, as life didn't come to earth for a long time after the planet was created. Ignoring that fact, we also know that the amount of life on earth dipped significantly during major catastrophes such as the asteroid which made the dinosaurs extinct 65 million years ago. This also doesn't allow for species to be extinct. Let's assume that those who behave best in their previous life become humans in their next life. Suppose humans go extinct, that would make it scientifically impossible for there to be more humans on earth. However, the code of reincarnation states that whenever someone behaves exceptionally well, that someone will become a human. The fact that no more humans are born either means that 1) no one behaves exceptionally well (virtually impossible), or 2) reincarnation is false. Even if you argue that this is true only for large groups of species, it doesn't explain why dinosaur's went extinct. It also doesn't explain evolution, i.e. there were no humans 10 million years ago.
Abrahamic religions: These religions have frequently contradicted modern science, and have often discouraged it. They have stuck to the ideals of Aristotle, and disputed theories such as the big bang, evolution, and that heavy objects fall as quickly as light objects. It is impossible to argue that these religions have been right in every way.
Finally, to those who say "I believe that there is some energy in the universe which controls everything". You need to specify whether this "energy' has any power, whether you need to pray to appease it, and whether it observes your behaviour and possibly reciprocates. If the answer to all these questions is "no", then you're effectively an atheist in denial, and live the life of an atheist. If however you need to appease the deity by praying to it, or preach how the deity is noble, and rewards the good, then you are not an atheist, and in fact believe in god. There is an energy which controls things, outside the laws of physics, and that is randomness, the force which defines random outcomes in the short run. Unfortunately there is no such force, as these outcomes can't be predicted, and if you believe in one, you do so because you feel that life is meaningless without one. This does not however mean that the force actually exists. If the force did exist, then monks wouldn't be praying, but would be winning millions of dollars in las vegas. Also, if a god existed, he wouldn't allow for scarcity, unless he believed in schadenfreude and liked to see us suffer. Many paradoxes also arise, such as the "can god make a rock so heavy that he can't lift it" question, and as physics tells us, paradoxes are impossible.
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