Why do people play the benoni defense?

White gets +0.85 or higher than a pawn right out of the opening! Even though computers are supposed to be bad at valuing openings, that still seems like a huge white advantage. If engines are incorrectly evaluating the position, why? And what would the correct evaluation be? 

For starters, engine evaluations at depth 22 can hardly be trusted, especially when it's only move seven. I checked the position in Chessbase:The latest version of Komodo gives white a small advantage (+0.36) at depth 46. Nobody knows what the "correct" evaluation is, but I suspect this one is closer.

The Benoni is a practical opening for fighters. Objective evaluations, if they exist, doesn't matter at all when two human players try to solve difficult tactical and strategical problems over the board with their own brains.

Edit: typo.

Couple of reasons I can think of

1) Black may prefer the Benoni over the Queen's Indian or Bogo Indian if white avoids the Nimzo-Indian (or even Budapest) with an early Nf3. Black I think can also often transpose from the fianchetto King's Indian or Catalan to the Benoni.

2) Like the King's Indian, white can't really prevent black from adopting a Benoni setup. This means black can just learn this one opening as a complete answer to 1. d4. Not everyone wants to learn the rather wide range  of different setups of the Slav/Semi-Slav white can try.

3) There really isn't a 'bail-out' option for white in the Benoni...Slav/Semi-Slav players looking for a win as black have to keep in mind that white can try the exchange variation on them for example.

Objectively black hasn´t to much theoretical problems in the Benoni after Nf3. White has some dangerous tries, but if black knows his stuff (and is not afraid of some drawish looking lines), he will be fine after the opening. And because the position is so strategically unbalanced, black can take it from there and can try to go for the win.

The only real problem IMHO (but also in the opinion of other benoni players and authors) is the Flick Knife/Taimanov with 7.f4 and 8.Bb5+, where I am not sure, that black can equalise (and I would even say, that White´s moves are easier to find).  In the move order 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 c5 4.d5 black should be more or less alright.

Because it is a good opening.

It's a common mistake by beginners and people only moderately acquainted with chess to think that the computers can tell you exactly how good a position is. Even good players who understand computers a lot better have been noticed to lack a full understanding of what they are doing and often use them poorly. Grandmasters are the best at using computers because they understand what they're useful for and what they're useless for. Engines are great at finding the best lines for themselves to play, not humans a lot of the time.      

There is no such thing as "the correct evaluation", again a lot of people seem to get confused about this. What might be a great opening for one player might cause another player to lose. With objectively best play on both sides you're talking about win, lose or draw which is the only "correct evaluation". Everything else is just preference, and in computer terms what an engine prefers to play itself. Engines are tweaked to prefer computer-favourable lines. There are positions requiring incredible accuracy that a computer will willingly play into while it would be daft for humans to, for example the fried liver. Even between different computers - stockfish is known to give much large magnitude "evaluations" than houdini, what houdini might like stockfish might disagree with. If a computer is telling you one position is 0.7 greater than another at a large depth then something is probably up but not necessarily. Trusting the computer over your glances is one thing, trusting it over hundreds of years of grandmaster theory and practice is ridiculous.    

The computer evaluation is meant to be based on pawns, but it happens all the time where you are two pawns down but completely winning. All half-reasonable positions out of the opening have the "correct evaluation" of a draw even if they are played terribly, so in that sense the correct evaluation is 0. There are good moves and bad moves but chess moves are always subjective because you have to actually play them. Another thing is a player may just have more fun playing a certain way, which is supposed to be the whole point of chess and may lift mood and cause better play for that reason.  

A final thing is that the Benoni unbalances the game with the intention of playing for a win, rather than a more symmetrical opening that could lead to a draw if the other player tries to kill the game. It is well-known to be a bit loose in terms of defence, but its results are still great. So a part of it may also be that black is accepting a small weakness for good attacking chances, but again computer evaluations are unreliable and there is no point in looking at a computer evaluation unless you understand it. 

@uhohspaghettio1, finally  someone telling the truth. Those computer evaluations might make sense if you are playing a computer but against a human they are useless. This is valid for every opening.

Engine sucks when evaluating opening. Don't use them. And Benoni is the riskiest option. Chances of draw is unlikely since white has this 1 line which can decimate black. Benoni is only for true and sharp warrior

Computer evaluations are not to be trusted in certain Indian defences. If you load a main line King's Indian game (with the attacks on opposite wings), the computer will tell you white is winning for the biggest part of the game, untill he get's mated.

So WHY are computers misevaluating the benoni, and what would the correct centipawn evaluation be?

Bullshift.

BENKO!

I am not a chess expert or anything, but I have to get this off my chest.

Benoni Defense = Banana Defense

Ok im done

That just made no sense whatsoever

so mr. pfren, WHY are computers misevaluating the benoni, and what would the correct centipawn evaluation be?

Why do you keep repeating this question? People have answered this several times in several ways stating why the engine is like this. If you can't understand it now it's because you're too stupid.

I also answered how and why there is no such thing as "correct evaluation", did you not read my answer? That's the answer. 

Sorry I'm mentally retarded and have special needs regarding explanations and answers. Thank you for understanding.

Thank you for being so understanding, 69AlphaMale109, my mentally deficient brain is thankful for your empathy

Thank you, I will need all the luck I can get to increase my IQ by 50 points but im grateful anyways, thank you. Perhaps playing the benoni defense will help bring my IQ up to the below average level, as opposed to the severely retarded level.

Good luck.