If you could push a button and kill god, would you?

[Beerina]

If you could push a button and kill Yahweh, and in such a way that Hell and Death collapsed, pain and suffering were ended, and people just lived pleasant lives as long as they wanted, without fear of pain or terror or torture, would you?

Or is the idea that most people are bound for Hell, unless they jump through goofy hoops and are rewarded with a sexless afterlife, the ultimately preferred state of being?

[bluess]

Nah, but I would kill the FSM, as his noodliness offends me.

[Hawk one]

Well, I'd just kill God for the sake of avenging all the people he's murdered and sent to torture without a second thought. Won't even have to change anything about the world, just giving him what he's got a loooooooong time coming. :)

[Freethinker]

Nah, but I would kill the FSM, as his noodliness offends me.

Blasphemer!:jaw-dropp

[cyborg]

Kill them all and let... oh wait...

[MWare]

I already did. Nobody else seems to have noticed though.

[Dark Jaguar]

God is dead, and here's the body to prove it.

[Marquis de Carabas]

How far do I have to reach to push the button? Is there anyone else around I could ask to push it for me instead?

[bluess]

Blasphemer!:jaw-dropp

You FSM fundies. I know your type. You probably secretly eat pasta carbonara with the window curtains drawn.

Edited for stupid grammar mistake.

[roger]

Ya, pretty much, assuming he isn't needed to make new souls. It'd get tedious killing off all the zombies after awhile.

[Freethinker]

You FSM fundies. I know your type. You probably secretly eat pasta carbonara with the window curtains drawn.

Edited for stupid grammar mistake.

The FSM was noodling your brain to cause the grammer error. You'd better watch it.

[bluess]

The FSM was noodling your brain to cause the grammer error. You'd better watch it.

FSM Fundie! You blame FSM for everything wrong in your life. When will you take on personal responsibility? I hold myself accountable for typing without enough coffee in my system.

Edited for stupid punctuation mistake.

Hmm. Maybe I should bow to his holy noodliness...

[strathmeyer]

Hey, if you wanna press this button, you're going to have to get past me, first.

[Piscivore]

Just push a button? Where's the fun in that? I'd want to torture him for weeks on end, tormenting him with sharp little hooks, exotic pharmaceuticals and maybe a hall of mirrors. Bright lights, whips and high-pressure hoses. And Carnival music. Completely mess with his head. Maybe even letting him think he'd escaped for a little while before dragging him back to the funhouse.

And then the fish-slapping would begin.

[Beleth]

I would reserve my decision until after He had a chance to convince me to take one or the other course of action.

[KillerBob]

If you could push a button and kill Yahweh, and in such a way that Hell and Death collapsed, pain and suffering were ended, and people just lived pleasant lives as long as they wanted, without fear of pain or terror or torture, would you?

Or is the idea that most people are bound for Hell, unless they jump through goofy hoops and are rewarded with a sexless afterlife, the ultimately preferred state of being?


Before you install the button to grease him, you should probably
come up with another button that would make him exist in the first place.

[Piscivore]

Before you install the button to grease him, you should probably
come up with another button that would make him exist in the first place.

There is one (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peyote).

[Alphaba]

If you could push a button and kill Yahweh...
You mean THIS button? Ooops!

[wastepanel]

If you could push a button and kill Yahweh, and in such a way that Hell and Death collapsed, pain and suffering were ended, and people just lived pleasant lives as long as they wanted, without fear of pain or terror or torture, would you?

Or is the idea that most people are bound for Hell, unless they jump through goofy hoops and are rewarded with a sexless afterlife, the ultimately preferred state of being?

I don't quite understand your post. If you are assuming there is a God, then you would also need to know the consequences of your actions, not just the "perks". Would this end the lives of humans(since "fear of pain or terror or torture" would be ended)? This is too one-sided to say "yes" or "no".

This is like asking "There are two brothers. If you kill brother A, Brother B will never have a problem in his life and be wealthy beyond his dreams. You do not know these brothers at all, and never will."

[Piggy]

If you could push a button... in such a way that... people just lived pleasant lives as long as they wanted, without fear of pain or terror or torture, would you?
Well, if you (by which I mean "I") put it like that....

Yeah. Sure. Why not?

Unless there were also a button that would make everything vanish, as though it had never been. In which case, I would push that button instead.

Why do you ask?

[clarsct]

Nope. I would merely THREATEN and BLACKMAIL with the button. If you got the big man by the short hairs, why not squeeze a little?

[bruto]

Nope. I would merely THREATEN and BLACKMAIL with the button. If you got the big man by the short hairs, why not squeeze a little?

That's what I was thinking. Turn the tables. Tell him if he doesn't start behaving I'll send HIM to hell.

[Morrigan]

Why push a button, when you can use a rifle, like this guy?

http://pc59te.dte.uma.es/cdb/series/vertigo/bitmaps/saintkillers.jpg

/Yes, I would.
//loves Preacher

[Arkan_Wolfshade]

Ren: See this button?
(Stimpy reaches for the button)
Ren: DON'T TOUCH IT! It's the HISTORY ERASER button, you FOOL!
Stimpy: So what'll happen?
Ren: That's just IT! We don't KNOW! Maayyybeee something bad?...Mayyybeee something good! I guess we'll never know! 'Cause you're going to guard it! You won't TOUCH it, will you?
(Stimpy salutes. Ren leaves.)
Ren: Hehhh...hehhhh...hehhhh...hehhhh...
(Stimpy marches back and forth, starting at the button.)
Announcer: Oh, how long can trusty Stimpy hold out? How can he possibly resist the diabolical urge to push the button that could erase his very existence? Will his tortured mind give in to its uncontrollable desires?
(Announcer grabs Stimpy, forces him closer to the button.)
Can he resist the temptation to push the button that, even now, beckons him even closer? Will he succumb to the maddening urge to eradicate history? At the MERE...PUSH...of a SINGLE...BUTTON! The beeyootiful SHINY button! The jolly CANDY-LIKE button! Will he hold out, folks? CAN he hold out?
Stimpy: NO I CAN'T!!!EEEEEYAAAHHHH!
(pushes button)
(Alarms go off. Ren, Stimpy, and Announcer stand around table with button.)
Announcer: Tune in next week, as... (Flash, explosion as they all disappear.)

[Jorghnassen]

Oh yeah... I saw a short movie a bit like that. You see some dude pushing a button on a box. The scene changes, and you see some other guy come with said button on a box and offers it to some third random guy. The guy with the box tells that random guy he will give him a million dollar if he pushes the button. It will kill someone he doesn't know, will never know, has no close or far relation to and no one will ever link the death back to the button pusher, so that death will be of no consequence to the button pusher. He gives the random guy a week to think about it. So the random guy at the end of the week decides to push the button. The guy with the money comes back and gives the million dollar to the random guy, taking back the box with the button, telling him he will now take it to someone the random guy doesn't know, will never know, has no connections to and make the same offer... In the last scene, we see the first dude lying dead, surrounded by tons of cash.

/actually I didn't see that short movie, this is a second hand account
//I like stories

[Rufo]

I agree with wastepanel. Why assume that just hell and death would collapse? Since I suppose Yaweh is (in this hypothetical thought experiment, which I assume is about the mythological Yaweh and not some dude Beerina made up with the same name) ultimately as much responsible for the earth and mankind as for hell and death, why would only the 'bad' things vanish? Why would only pain and suffering end, and not happiness and satisfaction?

But okay, suppose all those good things happened - no, I don't think I'd do it anyway. 'Collapsing' death? I believe most of us can agree that hell is a fairly pointless concept, but death is a part of the natural order of things. I don't think anyone could really realistically figure out exactly how it would affect the world if death 'collapsed' (not that any of this is realistic anyway), and anyone who tried would hardly recommend it.

Besides... Limbo is not that bad... :rolleyes:

[.13.]

But okay, suppose all those good things happened - no, I don't think I'd do it anyway. 'Collapsing' death? I believe most of us can agree that hell is a fairly pointless concept, but death is a part of the natural order of things. I don't think anyone could really realistically figure out exactly how it would affect the world if death 'collapsed' (not that any of this is realistic anyway), and anyone who tried would hardly recommend it.


Naturalistic fallacy, It's natural so it must be good for you. :D

[Euromutt]

It all depends on whether everybody currently in existence, and in perpetuity thereafter, were to be made aware of the definitive and irrevocable destruction of the Supreme Being. Otherwise, what's to stop people from continuing to believe in their imaginary friend and engaging in sectarian strife, just like they've been doing the past several millennia?

[Rufo]

Naturalistic fallacy, It's natural so it must be good for you. :D
You mean we wouldn't face some annoying little problems if everything and everyone stopped dying?

[wastepanel]

I agree with wastepanel. Why assume that just hell and death would collapse? Since I suppose Yaweh is (in this hypothetical thought experiment, which I assume is about the mythological Yaweh and not some dude Beerina made up with the same name) ultimately as much responsible for the earth and mankind as for hell and death, why would only the 'bad' things vanish? Why would only pain and suffering end, and not happiness and satisfaction?

But okay, suppose all those good things happened - no, I don't think I'd do it anyway. 'Collapsing' death? I believe most of us can agree that hell is a fairly pointless concept, but death is a part of the natural order of things. I don't think anyone could really realistically figure out exactly how it would affect the world if death 'collapsed' (not that any of this is realistic anyway), and anyone who tried would hardly recommend it.

Besides... Limbo is not that bad... :rolleyes:

I'm glad you agree with me, and have taken the time to think about this.

[bruto]

Of course the whole argument is kind of silly, because if god is really what most people call God, that is the omni-this and omni-that kind of Jehovah god, he would be unkillable, and wouldn't let you do it anyway. Killing Jehovah would be a logical contradiction like a square circle. If you were presented with a magic button it would all be a trick, and to pass the test you'd have to say "no." And if it isn't that kind of personal god, then it isn't responsible for the kind of detail we usually attribute to it, and killing it would not accomplish what is hoped for. It would be a real bummer if "god" turned out to be the name for the force that holds the universe together, or the collective meaning of life, or something else equally abstract, call it the knot in the balloon of the universe, and we pushed the button and pfffffft!

[Mrs. Hmmphries]

How far do I have to reach to push the button? Is there anyone else around I could ask to push it for me instead?


I'll do it for a quarter...

[Jorghnassen]

I'll do it for a quarter...

Didn't you read that summary I wrote about a short film I've never seen?

[bjb]

That was a great story! The guy got to be rich for a week. I don't understand the ending since the second guy who pushed the button did have a connection to the first. They both met the guy with the button.

I'll press the godkill button, just as soon as I find my reaching stick.

[Mrs. Hmmphries]

Didn't you read that summary I wrote about a short film I've never seen?


But neither of those guys was god....

[Jorghnassen]

But neither of those guys was god....

But what about the guy who brings you the "kill god" button? That one is either a greater god or has connections with an ubergod of some sort, and then things get paradoxal...

[Mrs. Hmmphries]

But what about the guy who brings you the "kill god" button? That one is either a greater god or has connections with an ubergod of some sort, and then things get paradoxal...

Gah!
Don't go getting all existential on me!
I was only trying to be helpful...

[Beerina]

Of course the whole argument is kind of silly, because if god is really what most people call God, that is the omni-this and omni-that kind of Jehovah god, he would be unkillable, and wouldn't let you do it anyway. Killing Jehovah would be a logical contradiction like a square circle. If you were presented with a magic button it would all be a trick, and to pass the test you'd have to say "no." And if it isn't that kind of personal god, then it isn't responsible for the kind of detail we usually attribute to it, and killing it would not accomplish what is hoped for. It would be a real bummer if "god" turned out to be the name for the force that holds the universe together, or the collective meaning of life, or something else equally abstract, call it the knot in the balloon of the universe, and we pushed the button and pfffffft!

Nah, it's similar to John Lennon's "Imagine no Heaven". Wouldn't a better state of existence simply be without all that crap on top of life itself? Isn't the idea of an infinitely long Hell rather silly? In the sense that if it actually exists, it shows God to be idiotic and mean?

Take a deep breath, and say, "yes. Yes! YES! It is so stupid and mean of Him!"

[Beerina]

But what about the guy who brings you the "kill god" button? That one is either a greater god or has connections with an ubergod of some sort, and then things get paradoxal...

Given the vast, vast majority of people are doomed to an eternity of very painful torture, I'd say the risk is worth it. Mathematically (and literally, not figuratively) any other existence would be preferrable.

Any religious out there who want to argue that point?

[bruto]

Nah, it's similar to John Lennon's "Imagine no Heaven". Wouldn't a better state of existence simply be without all that crap on top of life itself? Isn't the idea of an infinitely long Hell rather silly? In the sense that if it actually exists, it shows God to be idiotic and mean?

Take a deep breath, and say, "yes. Yes! YES! It is so stupid and mean of Him!"

I agree we'd be better off without that kind of god; in fact I think we are. I don't necessarily think that that's the only kind of god there might be. The problem with the original question is that if we are stuck with Jehovah we can't kill him, and if we're not, then we'd better find out what we're killing first.

[LW]

Given the vast, vast majority of people are doomed to an eternity of very painful torture, I'd say the risk is worth it. Mathematically (and literally, not figuratively) any other existence would be preferrable.

But what if the fundamentalist interpretation of Col.1:17 was correct and it is Jesus or Yahvew that holds the universe together? Then pressing the kill button would immediately destroy the universe. Would non-existence be preferrable?