Seems like a good place for the experiment I described earlier. What would you do differently if God spoke to you and said:
I quit. From now on, the materialists are right, your mind is in your brain, there is no soul, no afterlife, no reincarnation, no heaven, and no hell. If your brain is destroyed before you can copy the information out, you’re gone.
As some context, I believe in a God that is helping us to develop to become like him, all-loving, all-wise, etc, and will then give us the same amount of power he has. This isn’t expected to come until long after death. Should I succeed and reach that state, it will mean that I would be the kind of being who would continue acting in a good, godlike manner even if God told me he was taking a vacation.
Given that, if God did tell me that, I would sign up for cryonics tomorrow. I would hope to hell God changed his mind, because I really like his plan. But if he didn’t, I would have to try to implement his plan and become a god by myself (assuming I do succeed in achieving immortality.) And figure out why he quit. Given that he did quit, it’s possible I would come up with a better plan along the way.
(It would also be interesting to me what parts of the machine still work when the machinist retires. I believe our consciences are an essential part of God’s plan – do they still work? What about negative effects from addictive substances? Will people still exhibit similar amounts of altruism?)
Seems like a good place for the experiment I described earlier. What would you do differently if God spoke to you and said:
Hmm...this might be an atypical answer.
As some context, I believe in a God that is helping us to develop to become like him, all-loving, all-wise, etc, and will then give us the same amount of power he has. This isn’t expected to come until long after death. Should I succeed and reach that state, it will mean that I would be the kind of being who would continue acting in a good, godlike manner even if God told me he was taking a vacation.
Given that, if God did tell me that, I would sign up for cryonics tomorrow. I would hope to hell God changed his mind, because I really like his plan. But if he didn’t, I would have to try to implement his plan and become a god by myself (assuming I do succeed in achieving immortality.) And figure out why he quit. Given that he did quit, it’s possible I would come up with a better plan along the way.
(It would also be interesting to me what parts of the machine still work when the machinist retires. I believe our consciences are an essential part of God’s plan – do they still work? What about negative effects from addictive substances? Will people still exhibit similar amounts of altruism?)
Thanks. That is a typical answer, and it’s what I wanted to hear.
I’ll assume that my motives in asking the question were covered adequately in the sibling of the parent post (uncle post?) so I won’t reiterate.
And thanks for dealing with the hostile anti-religious crap in some of the other questions. That takes some emotional fortitude.