People can hold conflicting ideas and beliefs because of the mind's remarkable
ability to compartmentalize, like pigeonholes in a mail sorting room. They can
think one thought, then move to another compartment and an opposing thought
does not connect or collide with the other. They just don't experience the
conflict. Some minds are more compartmentalized than others, and I'm not sure,
but I suspect that religion tends to increase this. Atheists, having stepped
out of, or never been in that process, tend to have minds more like a large
room with only a few compartments, where just about everything can see
everything else. So contradicting ideas don't last long, and atheists can
sometimes have a harder time being patient and understanding of people who
harbor contradicting ideas.