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Stark wrote:I'm running with Zablorg's retarded 'you teleport to hell with equipment intact' 'scenario'. If true millions of armed men have showed up in hell, sometimes tens of thousands a day.

Why the fuck does that matter? If I'm going to be tortured and raped by demons, I want to kill some folk first.

Zablorg wrote:Why the fuck does that matter? If I'm going to be tortured and raped by demons, I want to kill some folk first.

How do you know you can kill them, or even hurt them? All we know is that there is incontrovertible, objective evidence that hell and demons exist. We don't know anything about the physical nature of these beings or their vulnerabilities.

Refer to earlier 'angry 14 year old boy' comment. It amuses me a great deal that your response to 'be tortured in hell' is 'kill a bunch of unrelated people out of pique, achieving nothing'. The best part is it'll just make your torture in hell worse for being uppity.

While the original discussion has been hopelessly hijacked (by guess who lol) I don't think it makes sense anyway. It's only god, after all: he can't prove his claims and the majority of the human race wouldn't care anyway as not Christian. Unless their was a giant purple whirlpool in the sky eating people's souls when they died, I think most people would ignore the statement.

Stravo wrote:Would people panic and freak out?

Yes. They've just been given proof that they are bound for unavoidable, permanent torment. You know that sooner or later you'll be force-fed your own guts and eaten alive by spider demons. And there's nothing you can do about it. It's literally the worst thing ever.

Would murderers become the most heinous criminals of all? (Not that they weren't but you get my drift, if you kill someone you are also consigning them to hell for all eternity.)

Aside from God himself, yes.

Would having children be seen as reprehensible?

I don't think so. It's possible that having kids will be seen as a good thing since it's one of the few things that can give us hope that someone, eventually, will figure out a way to fix things.

Would nations go to war anymore knowing the price their soldiers pay and even if they did would their soldiers fight?

You would think so, but I think politicians are sufficiently bastardly to think ruthlessly killing the enemy outright will protect their own soldiers rather than ceasing armed conflict. I would envisage a drawing back of troops, though, perhaps everyone being defensive.

Would suicide bombing cease over night?

I doubt it, religion would just fracture and people would claim God is looking after them as always.

Has religion lost its meaning now that no matter what you say or do you are damned?

It will continue to offer false hope and merely deny the divinity of the entity that appeared.

Perhaps I'm missing a much more basic reaction. Would humanity simply blow itself up in a fit of suicidal insanity at the prospects facing us?

Or would humanity actually go on, perhaps drop significantly in population but still go on. And on a moral level is it per se evil to have children if you know they will eventually suffer for all eternity?

Humanity would soldier on in a futile attempt to fix the problem. I imagine the vast majority of world resources would go into investigating the nature of the paranormal, and whatever we can do to extend life at all costs. Immortality just became the number one goal.

We would rationalise the doomed nature of humankind, we would come up with religions that lie just as much as the current ones and give false hope against the god that appeared. It would be morally evil to have children for a vain hope of salvation, but due to the way our lives revolve around breeding and the hope it would give us, I wouldn't really blame people for doing it.

Also, iron chariots don't stop God. A couple of pages after Judges 1 (which specifies the limitations of the men of Judah, rather than God) God beats a king with similar armaments.

The true point of the thread is to discuss a situation of sheer hopelessness and what will happen when life is only a brief respite from hell and simple things like having children might be seen as a crime or immoral.

Essentially how would humans react knowing that the end of life brings an eternity of pain. You can either try to live it to the fullest or beat yourself against the wall in hopeless desperation. I wonder how it would truly be.

I just thought the storming the gates of heaven response was cool because of the image and more importantly it was refreshingly unexpected. But in truth there's no hope of that. We're fucked. How do we handle that prospect of eternal pain?

Stravo wrote:The true point of the thread is to discuss a situation of sheer hopelessness and what will happen when life is only a brief respite from hell and simple things like having children might be seen as a crime or immoral.

Essentially how would humans react knowing that the end of life brings an eternity of pain. You can either try to live it to the fullest or beat yourself against the wall in hopeless desperation. I wonder how it would truly be.

I just thought the storming the gates of heaven response was cool because of the image and more importantly it was refreshingly unexpected. But in truth there's no hope of that. We're fucked. How do we handle that prospect of eternal pain?

We try anyways.

Like you said, we're fucked. Doesn't matter. The probability of success is microscopic. But the cost of inaction and abject failure are identical, so why the hell not?

Stark wrote:Whoa, I missed the part where the thread was about making up fantasy nonsense about 'hell'. I hear it's like Dante's Inferno... for no reason.

Wait wait wait. Are you saying all that stuff about Hell in the Bible isn't made up fantasy nonsense?! You have totally just shattered my worldview!

You can't even GET to heaven. You don't even know where it is, or even if it still exists.

Rye raises an interesting point when he says that people will just make shit up or reinterpret what was said to continue in their beliefs. People would just convince themselves that it didn't apply to them, or it only happened if you didn't murder enough darkies, or whatever. Since nobody ever comes back, eventually people would forget and it would be as irrelevant as it is now.

Stark wrote:While the original discussion has been hopelessly hijacked (by guess who lol) I don't think it makes sense anyway. It's only god, after all: he can't prove his claims and the majority of the human race wouldn't care anyway as not Christian. Unless their was a giant purple whirlpool in the sky eating people's souls when they died, I think most people would ignore the statement.

As I said, the only way for incontrovertible proof to exist is for it to be subject to scientific analysis.

While the OP says 'incontrovertible proof', that apparently consists of god saying 'later fools'. Without some actual evidence of life after death, it'll be difficult for the non-religious (or non-Christian) to give a shit. If it's communicated to media outlets or leaders (or the fucking Pope), a lot of people who don't personally witness it are going to react even less strongly.

I think a giant purple whirlpool that tears transparent blue souls out of fresh corpses and drags them into the sky would probably do it, though.

Stark wrote:You can't even GET to heaven. You don't even know where it is, or even if it still exists.

Rye raises an interesting point when he says that people will just make shit up or reinterpret what was said to continue in their beliefs. People would just convince themselves that it didn't apply to them, or it only happened if you didn't murder enough darkies, or whatever. Since nobody ever comes back, eventually people would forget and it would be as irrelevant as it is now.

Actually, I doubt there'd be no social change. Essentially, the scientific/cultural zeitgeist now includes definitive proof of the paranormal and the futility of existence. The "mainstream" would have to accommodate that and respond accordingly.

While there would be the potential for Nietzsche's fear of cataclysmic nihilism, I think that state of mind is diffused by social interaction. Everyone would lean on one another for support and we'd end up with hope regardless of the situation. Then we'd try to fix it and religion may become further marginalised. I would envisage that given the dangerous messages God is giving, states would clamp down on religions so lethal conflicts that would ignore the facts of the afterlife are nipped in the bud.

As for what would account for definitive proof, I was more thinking along the lines of that hoax of russians digging a big quarry and accidentally digging through to a big window over a section of Hell.

Stark wrote:You can't even GET to heaven. You don't even know where it is, or even if it still exists.

So storm Hell.

SirNitram wrote:

Stark wrote:You can't even GET to heaven. You don't even know where it is, or even if it still exists.

So storm Hell.

no lol is stupid idea you so stupid rofl. why strom hell they r onnly gonna torture u more lul.

Maybe the government would try to cover up the existence of hell so that we don't go all emo.

Zuul wrote:As for what would account for definitive proof, I was more thinking along the lines of that hoax of russians digging a big quarry and accidentally digging through to a big window over a section of Hell.

The OP doesn't suggest hell is a physical place, does it? It's just 'afterlife = torment', not 'when you die you get teleported underground where it's a metal fan convention all day'.

While I'm not sure on the degree of social change, I certainly think that over time whatever effect will be significantly reduced. Nobody ever comes back from hell (the afterlife itself is totally unknown) so we'd have no way of knowing if it was even true. There isn't even an afterlife at all, but people make shit up about it anyway.

SirNitram wrote:So storm Hell.

How? Make a really cool army then blow it up on purpose?

Stark wrote:The OP doesn't suggest hell is a physical place, does it?

Yes it does. It says that incontrovertible proof exists of a number of conditions, including not only our fate to go to Hell but also the nature of Hell. If it's not a physical place, there would be no way to acquire empirical proof.

Stark wrote:

SirNitram wrote:So storm Hell.

How? Make a really cool army then blow it up on purpose?

I realize that must have sounded witty in your head. But try thinking for ten seconds. Empirical, incontrivertible proof means something must have gone there and come back.

So clearly, it is possible to attack it.

We'd probably want to try and contact certain individuals down there who might be able to help us organize our campaign to conquer Hell in the name of homo sapiens. Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar ...

If it's a physical place then we might be able to get cheap reliable energy from the infinite flames of eternal damnation.

Darth Wong wrote:We'd probably want to try and contact certain individuals down there who might be able to help us organize our campaign to conquer Hell in the name of homo sapiens. Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar ...

Pretty much. Once a beachhead is established, you have the sum total of all militaries ever at your disposal. And in the face of eternal pain, they will fight.

In such a scenario, should Heaven exist, it'd be smart to conceal it's existance. Because while the probability of conquering Hell is low, it gives one an immense labour pool, and the potential to find the rest.

The thermodynamics of Hell would be interesting to examine. Does it have an infinite power source? Or would the act of tapping into it as a power source cause an eventual cooling death of Hell?

SirNitram wrote:

Stark wrote:

SirNitram wrote:So storm Hell.

How? Make a really cool army then blow it up on purpose?

I realize that must have sounded witty in your head. But try thinking for ten seconds. Empirical, incontrivertible proof means something must have gone there and come back.

So clearly, it is possible to attack it.

And what if it's behind a barrier only penetrable by dying permanently? Also good luck getting tactical advice from someone who's been tortured non-stop with no precautions for mortality for a week, let alone centuries.

Darth Wong wrote:Yes it does. It says that incontrovertible proof exists of a number of conditions, including not only our fate to go to Hell but also the nature of Hell. If it's not a physical place, there would be no way to acquire empirical proof.

You've got me there. I'm not sure that's what he meant, but it's certainly impossible to prove souls go to hell without demonstrating what it is.

I just wish I could work a giant purple vortex in there somewhere.

Sir Nitram wrote:I realize that must have sounded witty in your head. But try thinking for ten seconds. Empirical, incontrivertible proof means something must have gone there and come back.

So clearly, it is possible to attack it.

So... because something goes there, it must be down the street and accessible? Even if it WAS under the ground (which strikes me as absurd, but the whole idea of an afterlife is absurd so what the hell) what are you going to do, dig a big hole? If there *are* demons in there (which doesn't seem likely, but hey we're in fantasyland already) they're successfully containing and torturing sixty billion human beings. Is this a good plan?

If it was Hades, it wouldn't even be a conversation. But Stravo is just talking about the afterlife being torment and how this affects the world. Ironically, it probably WOULD thrust all kinds of lunatics to positions of power on meaningless 'blow up hell' platforms.

Darth Wong wrote:The thermodynamics of Hell would be interesting to examine. Does it have an infinite power source? Or would the act of tapping into it as a power source cause an eventual cooling death of Hell?

Clearly the constant compression of new souls creates soular heating?

'El Oh El Nihilism rocks'.

If dying permenantly was the only way, nothing can come back. Try again sparky. I realize it's so much easier to simply play devil's advocate than think, but I'm sure you can manage if you take a running start at it.