And why is that?

Yup. That's what I meant.

Absolutely.

And I think you would be right to do so.
I'd like to put it stronger than that: anyone who does the opposite (argue that homosexuality is evil, and homosexuals should therefore have fewer rights, or be prosecuted) is guilty of not tolerating other views or lifestyles, and should rightfully be condemned for it. But it's complicated. Things are much simpler if you just don't accept other views.

Schools should definitely not be teaching it, at least not as part of the curriculum that deals with our current best understanding of the cosmos.
But they should be free to teach (in the relevant course) that some people believed that the Earth was a flat disk, sitting on top of a bunch of elephants, standing on an infinite stack of enormous turtles. Or that in the middle-ages, the belief that the Sun went around the Earth was wide-spread (as long as they don't teach the fiction that everyone thought the Earth was flat until Columbus sailed across the Atlantic to get to India).
But yes, it's a tricky question. I can't find the reference at the moment, but at least one investigation found that when you give equal time to intelligent design and evolution, there is a larger fraction of students that come to the conclusion that evolution is, shall we say, better argued and documented.

It is. I don't think there's an easy answer as long as you want to be tolerant of other ideas.
And I think we should be (I also think we shouldn't start sentences with words like "and"), because I quite like to have the freedom to think whatever the hell I want myself, and the only way I can be assured of that is if everyone has that freedom. Which, unfortunately, includes people who are opposed to that same freedom.
Yeah, ok, again, complicated.

I'm sure someone will come around shortly and say I'm being close-minded and not open to "alternative" explanations for what I just said about evolution and intelligent design.

OK, you do the praying for both of us and I'll do the thinking for both of us.

Sure, but they tend not to say things like

or

"Innocence" can be construed as believing in fairy tales.

There are plenty of studies that show being a God fearing person leads to longer life etc, but that's partly a result of not so likely to engage in risky behaviors such as driving around with high blood alcohol etc. There's also the placebo effect.

And since so many Americans are praying for an American victory in the Middle East, and so many Muslims are praying for the exact opposite, how does God decide?

You'd be better off with an example that doesn't cross religions.

You're asking for the impossible. You would find fault with any conclusive study because your mind is already made up.

I believe in things in which there exists credible scientific evidence supporting its claims. Thus, if one day, there came some form of evidence that proved the existence of God beyond all reasonable doubt, I would become a believer.

My avatar is debatable in itself.

I don't doubt if God himself landed a UFO in front of your house and did a few magic tricks that you'd probably believe something supernatural happened.

But you are already backing up from your previous claim that "Show me a study that undeniably proves the absolute effectiveness of prayers". With every conclusive study, you'd just say you need one more study, etc.

Just to throw a thought out there ...

This would probably cause me to become a non-believer, personally. Science is supposed to be about the natural world. God is supernatural. Having natural evidence for something supernatural would just mean it wasn't supernatural. Am I wrong?

Praying is more for the prayer rather than the prayee. There's way too many people praying contrasting prayers for any "absolute effectiveness".

Praying is an attempt to make a connection to an entity they believe exists. That very belief makes the prayer feel comfort, even though they could just as well be talking to a wall. There's a reason a lot of people have imaginary friends while growing up.

Sounds like a good argument not to believe, but I am not entirely convinced that science has answered everything and that some divine entity could be shrouded in that unresolved mystery. Most scientific minds believe that is such a small chance that it is completely negligible. To me, it isn't negligible and therefore validates trying to connect with such an entity via prayer. Beyond this, I've become skeptical of most other religious teachings, considering them a work of fiction unless I can be handed physical evidence / proof.

Science never claimed it answered everything. It merely claims to form a hypothesis that can predict events, and if the hypothesis seems to work, it's advanced to a theory.

I feel left out. I'm going to check if there is a church of atheism so I can get baptised.