Re: My World.

[igosaur]

Let's say that somehow I created a Planet on my PC and populated this planet with plants and animals. But unlike software like sim earth these animals were real. Every bit as real as the animals that exist on the Earth today.

Then let's say I created a small race of human like beings. These beings were intelligent, sentient and self aware. Consciously they are as real as you or I. They have emotions, needs, longing, a sense of humour. They feel love, fear, joy, pain, happiness. Just as we do.

Now, not only did I create this world with all it's inhabitants but I also planned every aspect of their lives. There was not one thing that they did, do or will do that I did not know would happen before I even started this project.

I have also gone to a great deal of trouble to give this world a history. I have given it an entire universe to exist in which appears to have emanated from a mighty explosion some 13.7 billion years ago. I have given the planet itself an equally impressive past full of geology, fossil records, evolution and anything else I can think of to make the intelligent and inquiring mind come to the conclusion that all things are as a result of cause and effect with no supernatural element.

Let's further suppose that I love this world with all it's creatures and I want to have a 'personal' relationship with every human like being that exists on it. What I really want is for every person that I have created to worship me and love me and put me before all other people and things. I also want them to follow my rules and guidelines and as a reward for this, when they die they will be granted eternal life in another creation of mine called 'Paradise'.

However, in order for people to know, worship and obey me I must inform them of my existence and my will. I do this by planting thoughts and ideas into some of the peoples minds which eventually work there way into stories which are discussed around camp fires and other gatherings and then get written down.

Many of the stories I plant are in direct contradiction to the physical evidence that lies all around.

After a thousand years or so these stories get compiled into many holy books which many people claim are the word of the creator. Many of the stories claim that I have personally spoken to people throughout history but there is no other evidence other than the stories in these books to support that. I certainly don't intervene to corroborate these stories.

After a while I decide that things aren't going the way I planned so I create a special human with special knowledge to live amongst them and nudge them in the right direction. Not only do I give this human special knowledge I also give him the ability to bypass many of the routines and programming that I used to create this world to allow him to do amazing things such as walk on water, or heal the sick etc.

This man roams around for a few years in his thirties, performing a few miracles and making many speeches. He gets a bit of a following and many people think he has been sent by the creator. However, many more people think he is just the latest in a long line of religious leaders who claim all sorts of things.

Eventually he gets killed and the seeds of a new religion have started.

Right, I think to myself, that's all the chances they are going to get. Either these people believe every word this special man has told them and through him worship, love, honour and obey me or when they die, no matter what sort of person they have been or what sort of life they have lead I'm either going to consign their conscious minds to oblivion or send them to another place I have created called 'Eternal Torment' where I can watch them scream and writhe in agony for all time.

Question is, if this were true, what sort of person would that make me?

[AlP]

I think that would make you a mad video game programmer reenacting the bible stories with a really fast computer =). It's for possibilities like this that I qualify atheist with agnostic. It's possible but just as improbable as any other creation story one cares to make up. Also, why not simulate the big bang in the computer and sit back and watch from then on?

[Whitney]

It would make you a sociopath.

[OKWithoutGod]

It would make you a sociopath.

Haha yeah, it would...  

[Renegnicat]

It would make you a horrible, horrible person.

[Moosader]

I programmed my own world once.  I didn't do a very good job since some humans mated with some fishes and their fish-man offspring ran around killing everything in sight.
 

[Fallen Jedii]

I love it! Very true!