I abso-freaking-lutely LOVE this thread. I've been reading up on philosophy a bit lately so

I am, however, a tad nervous about my responses since I don't want to piss anyone off by disagreeing with their religious beliefs. I have a very scientific view of the world and -- no offense to those who believe differently than me -- I don't give a lot of credence to religion (sans the fact that it's purposeful to most people).

My answers, all long and drawn out:
1. What is reality? That's something we've yet to figure out the answer to. Maybe it's all a deception and nothing is real -- a la the episode of 'American Dad' where the family was put into stasis gel and they were made to think they were experiencing an integrated family vacation; I don't mean "nothing is real" in the sense of a delusion. We use and know of a fraction of the brain's abilities so anything is possible. In a less sci-fi explanation, I think everything people perceive is real but the reality behind it is in the eye of the beholder or yet to be explained. Ex: A mirage. We see what looks like water waves but water isn't really there... Yet it's not a fictious hallucination, it's caused by a confluence of environmental factors. So even though it's an optical illusion, it really is there. A psych example: psychosomatic symptoms. In what reality does stress cause blanks in your field of vision? It does (or at least it can) in my reality, thanks to my migraines with auras.

2. Does God exist, and if so, what is His absolute nature? My highly unpopular belief is that religion is a man-made construct to explain things that couldn't/can't be explained by science at the time. It also serves to give people a purpose and/or direction and it helps alleviate the fear of death in that there's something more to come once their current life is done.

3. Why has consciousness evolved? Change is inevitable (a fact I hate very much) so for pretty much everything it's 'evolve or die.' However, in the case of consciousness, I don't know that it's evolved so much as it's a case of us not fully understanding it in the past. Ex: There's been a bunch of research done that shows that there's a lot of overlap (and thus misdiagnosing) between the autism spectrum and personality disorders, so much so that some articles I've read suggest that in the future they could be combined somehow. Anyway, how do we know that it's consciousness (as opposed to our understanding of consciousness) that has evolved?

4. What is the ultimate fate of ourselves, and this universe? Two part question....
a) I can understand this question in itself in two ways: A person's fate and the fate of humanity. As far as personal fate, I don't believe in fate or destiny. What happens happens and there isn't always a reason. (The only possible reason I can think of for, say, the Holocaust is 'to serve as a warning lesson to future generations' and that's complete and total BS with more BS heaped on top of the BS.) The inevitable fate of humanity, though, is exactly the same as it was with the dinosaurs -- something will happen that wipes us out and a whole new species will eventually populate the planet, (unless, of course, the planet becomes uninhabitable, but even then humanity will be wiped out).
b) I think the ultimate fate of the universe is, to a certain extent, dependent upon its original purpose/why it exists. Scientifically speaking, though, the universe will go through the usual life cycle of a star and eventually become a black hole.

However, I think your point in asking this was like mine, to figure out the purpose of life. The best I could figure out was to procreate but I don't understand: Procreating to what end? And what about those of us who can't and/or don't want kids? Does that mean my life is destined (so to speak) to be without purpose? I don't accept that.