Would people act differently in a setting in which the existence of gods, the afterlife...

This.
Unless the gods are actively intervening in the world to keep people behaving how they think they should.
And even then you should see a lit of people finding ways to rationalize weaseling around it, or just not bothering.

Only if they are publically known or using their true identities on earth. You're right about the WMDs though.

Greek gods, though. Imagine that you honestly believe that every time lightning strikes it's just Zeus having an anger fit. Also you believe that Zeus probably fucks your drinking buddy Philocrates, because well that's Zeus.

There's people who beleive the world is flat even tough there's hard evidence that its not.

So no. Besides its not like religious people don't actually believe in their gospel

>Atheists would still exist and be stubborn

I don’t think there’d be atheists. Or at least the people who atheists now wouldn’t be the kinds of atheists in such a scenario.

But what you might get are a group of people who for whatever region decide to abstain from worshipping the Gods. I mean, we know the sun is real, but there aren’t a lot of sun-worshippers knocking about. There’s a term for that kind of thing (acknowledging but not worshipping god) but I don’t know what it is.

that's the point, it's generic

unlike cyberpunk

Let's suppose is out of the question for whatever inane excuse.
Imagine all people, no matter how stupidly contrarian, are convinced without force or brainwash to see the truth: there are gods and magic and good and evil.
There are two main options.
-people who keep doing evil because of stupid egoistic impulse, same as the retard lighting his pants on fire because he believes he can easily slip through if things turn to the worse. And they will. And he probably won't.
-people who literally act like the gods command without the slightest hint of hope or bliss. They know that as a fact, as a rule, not as an act of good faith, they have to act like that to deserve the proper reward in the afterlife. Some might do out of sheer free will, but most will not. They'll just act good, but won't be.
Religions thrive on uncertainness and unprovability. If you prove godhood and objective good and evil, people won't just act good. They will just know different paths and some will still choose the wrong one.

You think the gods being physically observable would change there being atheists?

If anything it would make the ones who existed the most stubborn and conceited mortal beings to ever live.

>yeah yeah, i saw Gathros MYSELF last week..
>some "Star of the Dusk", he was barely even taller than my horse!
>you wanna spend your life bowing down to that purple fruitcake, thats your business. i've seen 'em and to be honest, i just ain't that impressed.

>Do you think people who believe in God don't really believe or something?

Most of them really, really don't. One need only to go to a funeral to see how hollow their belief is. If I told you your beloved father was leaving for several years to go to Paris France you would be bummed, but you would not mourn him. Yet if I tell he is going to Paradise, you would mourn him.

The people do not believe in Paradise like they do in Paris. They do not think of it as a place they could go, they do not imagine the heavens as having streets, walls, food, drink, inhabitants, culture, subculture, architecture, government, work, play, in short life.

The early Christians did, and they sang songs of triumph for their dead and insisted on saying 'they have just fallen asleep'. But the average pewpacker does not truly believe in these things in anything more then a strictly theoretical or hopeful manner.

We have flat-earthers and anti-vaxxers in our world so there's your answer.

you got the inquisition and the gods themselves going after them, tho. The atheists won't last long.

yeah focus on cyberpunk and use your imagination for it
better than all this theological ideas you'll never be able to able to handle right
everyone has its way

-able to

apatheism. Which is actually a type of atheism but it basically says "It's not that we think god isn't real, is that real or not, we don't care."

Oh yes because the resources of the Inquisition in a world where EVIL is real and so is the devil, should be spend chasing and killing random fedoralords.

If you're only worshiping a god because you know you'll get a reward, is it really faith?

It's cute that you believe you know the thoughts of the average theist. The only thing you proved is you know nothing about faith.

That's not really an atheist. That's just someone who doesn't worship a particular god.

Which is pretty standard for most of human history. Everyone believed in their own gods and acknowledged that while another culture's deities may be real and have power, they are not worthy of worship/veneration/obedience, especially if your own deities aren't up for it.

Dont forget about fear of eternal punishment.

>Christian theologian
>Doesn't know about faith

The average modern 'believer' does not seriously believe in any real sense. To pretend otherwise is to ignore the present reality.

I think the thing is that you can call or write your relative for New Year's if he packed his stuff and moved to Paris permanently. You can't call or write the dead.

>2018 Anno Domini
>Actually fearing hell
Don't do this.
vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_P2O.HTM
Under Catholic dogma it's literally fearing a choice you're not making.

Some clerics for you

>Traveling Brothers of the Warning
Black Robed monks who travel about in kingdoms warning of the 5 great dangers, dragons, demons, undead, plague, and floods, open to any male cleric above level 4. Essentially they travel about warning of dangers they have recently seen.
Patron St: St. Andrew of the omens

>Sisters of Care
Female clerics who rotate between field medic duties and nunnery stays, all Sisters of Care have a medical skill, usually amputations, antidoting, bone-setter, cast-maker, Medicine compounder, or Chirugion. Any female cleric above level 2 can become a member of this order.
Patron St: Saint Nina the caring and serene

>Brothers of Justice and Mercy
Red robed and charged with rooting out the 3 great enemies of the gods, Demoniacs, Heretics, and Witches. All brothers of justice and mercy have training in law skills & forensic skills such as Autopsy, Demon Lore, Witch Lore, or Recognize Heresy, and all are at least level 6 clerics. While in courtrooms, to protect their identities and to protect themselves from revenge attacks or witches, Brothers of Justice and Mercy wear tall pointed red miter-hoods and a special chest-chain with numerous holy signs on it. Members of this order are invited only, and must be confirmed by sufficiently high up hierarchy.
Patron Saint: St. Eusebius the justice of the peace

>Brothers and Sisters of Serene Sleep
A co-ed order of clerics who have undead-slaying specializing, specifically trained to destroy vampires, liches, ghouls, specters, and wraiths. Clerics of any level may join, but all clerics who join undergo training for not less than 7 years before assuming active duty.
Patron Saint: The Blessed Princess Saint Matilda II

It depends.

The real question is, would goddesses have leaked sex tapes?

I mean its kinda hard not to believe in god when god is literally beaming magic down into people and its proven to be god

I don’t want to get into exact numbers, but I think a lot of people are irreligious, and don’t want to commit to the label Athiest.

As someone said earlier, flat earthers.

Though personally I think this is the result of a broader anti-rationalism movement.

>Atheists would still exist and be stubborn.

Athiests don't believe in god because of a lack of clear, unambiguous evidence

If God's existence was as easily proven as the existence of gravity, than atheists would be significantly rarer

I can call my dad if he goes to Paris. He can come back if he goes to Paris. I can, and probably would go visit him in Paris

It depends on the relationships gods have with mortals, more than if they actually exist.

If you use Veeky Forums than you're automatically a pretty shitty christian

Depends.
How easy would it be to become a god yourself? If it's even slightly possible and has been done before, that kind of devalues the title.

>How easy would it be to become a god yourself?
What if Elon Musk is right and God is just a programmer? Then becoming gods ourselves would be as simple as cracking the code.

Yes, atheists would be just some weird small group of people who believe it's all a lie, while people would be divided between those who believe the good god speaks the truth, and those who believe the evil god is the one they should follow.

That sounds like something from a cyberpunk setting. A cyberpunk setting with gods, now how would that work?

a wonderful idea
I'll bless anyone with that kind of project

Jesus. Welcome to the 90s buddy.

Most of TSR/WotC settings had this at that time.

A) the early Christian conception of death was more Jewish, which doesn't really have heaven. Literally the dead lie until judgment day and then the pious live in the kingdom of God on earth.
B) the Christian conception of heaven, not the hallmark version you're familiar with, doesn't have cities and streets, you sit there for eternity staring at God while the choirs of angels sing about how awesome he is and you're just bathed in God's love and soaking it in forever

...Fuck it, I have nothing else to do tonight. Might as well do something with the idea.
It may take a while, though; this isn't the first idea I had and it won't be the last.

No. Lack of belief due to lack of evidence is agnostic, not athiest.

Agnostic is believing in what exists within reason, god exists or it doesn't, but it hasnt show itself so the agnostic individual doesnt believe.

Athiest has the belief that god doesnt exist, rational or not.

Yeah, but flat earthers are a significant minority. Saying that, "this one tiny community will still be present, therefore it's all the same" seems fallacious. Nevermind the fact that athiests denying plain fact wouldn't be the same group of rationalists at all. They'd be kooks.
How people will behave is also dependent on the character of the religion.
The old testament Yahweh is very different from the stoic inspired new testament Logo- I mean God, yeah, God.
I'm working on a setting where I more or less ask "what if generic indo-european mythology was true?" You have a pantheon of gods ranging from ambivalent to to benevolent, with only the god of war and various spirits being actively malevolent. I've been pouring research into it, and it's been a lot of fun.
In this setting, generally I'd say people are just a little bit kinder, because there's much more order to the cosmos. Things are predictable. Their prayers sometimes receive direct answers (rather than trying to find an answer in the noise of random events all the time). Having a guiding light enables them to better take care of themselves, and with that surfeit of resources comes a bit more generosity. If you're inclined to say "but people don't get kinder when given more stuff" then consider the following. People will eat eachother when resources are scarce, that's a fact. But when people are fat and comfortable, they're tend to be much more accepting and willing to share, and history also demonstrates that. There's a neat book that I'm missing the name of. Basically, it charts how what it calls "the empathic response" fluctuates with resource availability.
This gets rid of some of the mysticism that makes religion neat. But the ancient world didn't have too much mysicism. Augury, the Oracle, and other methods provided concrete ways of consulting the gods.

I'm not the user you replied to.
Yeah, but what are a handful of decades compared to an eternity so awesome you are literally incapable of imagining it? You should be celebrating.
Most christians don't even read their holy book. I did, and studied as a historical document. I lost my faith as a direct consequence of that.

I'm sure you're amazing.
Have fun with your future game.

2 sources you might draw inspiration from are Shadowrun (sega gen) and the TV show "American Gods".

Shadowrun was a pen and paper game as well at one point, but my only exposure to it was the video game.

You mean the real world?

>Do you think people who believe in God don't really believe or something?
It's the difference between believing in God and believing in gravity.

Which is harder, asking someone to lie, or asking someone to jump off a cliff?

>"American Gods".
I actually just finished reading it earlier this month. Good book, but I'll see what I come up with myself before drawing inspiration from other sources.

Guys. Guys, no. Things would change MASSIVELY. I'm going to use the modern world as an example.

Let's use Islamic fundamentalism as an example. The terrorists are inspired by a radical interpretation of Islam, and by extremist clerics. However, if Allah - in fact- informed every cleric "Yes, I approve of a campaign of war and terrorism against the West. Whoever dies will in fact have 72 virgins in Heaven" we're not going to have little outbreaks of violence. It would be all-out war with the West. We wouldn't even have a Muslim population, because every Muslim man who wasn't a terrorist would know he was going against God's word! (Conversely, if Allah explicitly disapproved of ISIS, the Caliphate would not exist. Clerics would extort true Muslims to slay or cast out the heretics, who are fighting AGAINST the dictates of Allah!)

The fabric of society would be fundamentally different. The Catholic church is a hive of corruption, because it's an organization that's shaped and formed by man. The Pope, as far as we know, does not receive communiques from God. But if he did, the entire structure would be completely different: Priests would be less focused on politicking and more on good deeds, because they're stockpiling credit for Heaven. No-one would dare to molest a child, because holy shit, you're setting yourself up for eternal damnation!

More, nearly every action in life would be focused on following the dictates of your religion, for the reward of eternal bliss. I'll add that even politics would be fundamentally different: Communism simply wouldn't work, because Communism is fundamentally atheist, which is retarded in a world there is demonstrable proof that Gods are real! You can't, for instance, chase the Dalai Lama out of Tibet and pull out an imposter: The REAL Dalai Lama, with the REAL Gods on his side, would have no trouble proving that he has God's favor.

So, I'm having a problem imagining what the physics of such a world look like. Specifically, objective Good and Evil just don't make sense to me. In our world, it's pretty clear that objective Good and Evil cannot ever exist because of complicated philosophical inferences.
What's different about that world that Good and Evil can ever be provable?

>Communism simply wouldn't work
I see, so nothing changes.

An interesting concept. I went a similar direction myself, the gods I used were as follows, admittedly some were unusual or late addition choices, but you may find it interesting, the three words next to each one are their portfolio of authorities.

>Krom - Asgard, Mountains, Champions
>Lapla - Marriage, Hearth, Hall (as in high hall/keep)
>Odin - Warfare, Travel, Experience
>Ziu - Wandering, Masculinity, Lightning
>Tyr - Weaponsmithing, Warfare, Wisdom

Krom & Lapla are married, Odin, Ziu, and Tyr are their sons.

>Thor - The Warhammer, Courage, Champions
>Lugh - Silver (the metal), Kingship, Protection
>Hermes - Roads, Messages, Bartering
>Oberon & Titania jointly share - Royalty, Alfheim, Magic
>Venus - Love, The Sea, Charisma (stat)
>Nodens - Protection, Chariots, Omens
>Artemis - Truth, Amazons, Wisdom (stat)
>Mars - Warfare, Pillaging, Armies
>Siva - Unknown, he keeps his portfolio intentionally secret, as he is most directly responsible for fighting demons
>Sif - Alfheim, Princesses, Fairies
>Bor & Ve jointly share - Justice, Spear, Axe
>Hera - Marriage, Women, Riches
>Oceanous - Seas, Shipping, Whales
>Chronus - Time, Order, Longevity
>Gaia - Earth (elemental), Motherhood, The Harvest
>Sol - Daytime, Light, Chivalry
>Nihta - Darkness, The moon, Sleep

Sol (male) and Nihta (female) married and produced human-kind as offspring.

>Hades - Death, The Afterlife, Eternity
>Persephone - Jewels, Serenity, Eternity
>Loki liefather - Deception, Thieves, Trickery
>Hecate - Magic, Witchcraft, Crossroads
>Hel the hideous - Sudden Death, Undead, Nifelheim

Hell, even the uber-rich would do things differently. They would actively strive to do as many good deeds as possible, not from altruism, but because they want to go to heaven. Trump would be like "I do the best good deeds, no one does good deeds like I do."

I'm completely understating this, of course. I can't begin to capture all the changes. Simply knowing that a valorous death sends you to Valhalla completely changes military strategy, which becomes less about winning and more about re-enacting the highlights of Doom.

(Similarly, if Hitler had the blessings of Norse gods, we wouldn't truly be able to denounce the Nazi regime. Hitler would have been, after all, only doing God's work.)

You don't understand how faith works. If I have faith in Allah and his will to expand islam by the sword, I'm gonna assume automatically that the creature that goes down and preaches against my belief is a demon and not my god. Or god trying to make me proof my faith by playing tricks if my religion allows for that notion. Stop applying your fedora logic to faith.

>They would actively strive to do as many good deeds as possible, not from altruism
>implying that counts
>implying that's not a sin

Yeah, you're right. Especially with that Trump comment, as silly and trivial as it may sound at first glance. I imagine it would also be a very uncomfortable lifestyle, receiving constant confirmation that indeed Big Brother is constantly watching you. Just imagine an actual, physical eye following you around at all times. I'd be uncomfortable even showering, let alone doing the questionable things all of us do once in a while.

Nice fedora meme, but this would be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt according to OP. Those last Muslim remnants would be proven objectively wrong. This deity could and would even either smite those guys or sit them down and explain exactly how and why they're horribly wrong and should stop being so horribly wrong. There's only so long you can keep denying in the face of truth before reality seeps in.

What happens when humans start wielding things like moabs, atomic bombs, VX gas, etc?

Could these so called "doomsday" weapons kill a god or not?

What would happen to earth if one suddenly died?

Gotterdamerung and Ragnarok take on a whole new dimension of suffering and war.

What if everyone, even the gods, was answerable to divine justice at all times and all places, and everyone will, definitely, answer for their misdeeds in this life up to and including badness accrued from previous lives?

Proof and faith are contradictory. You faggots are basically saying that for religion to work it must stop being religion.

But you mullah could tell you the truth, and he wouldn't dare to lie. He would go "No, Allah doesn't agree." In fact, you could go to ANY mullah, and they would tell you the same thing. I mean, he would say "Continue with this path, and your soul will be damned forever. Allah has spoken."

And he wouldn't be lying. He might not agree with what Allah wants, but he wouldn't dare to say anything else. God, after all, is always watching and is all-powerful.

mass hysteria, existential crisis, waves of violence, then finally routine
once the initial shock wears off, people eventutally go back to normal

people are surprisingly attached to normalcy

Except he wouldn't believe Allah said so. If you just want to go with "yes he would" you're not only making a world were X religion is proven fact but in a world where humans give a shit about proven facts. At this point you've deviated so much from reality that I don't know what profit you can get from the question.

It's unlikely. I don't think you can actually nuke god. Hell, you probably couldn't make a weapon like that without God's approval.

If God says "I don't want anyone to use nukes. Anyone who uses a nuke suffers eternal damnation" the entire line of research would collapse overnight.

The whole point is that he wouldn't NEED to believe that Allah said so. He would know it. He just received the word of God from on-high.

You don't need to believe in gravity, you know that gravity exists. You don't need to believe in your neighbor Bob, because Bob is right fucking there. Your mullah's beliefs wouldn't matter, because Allah is objectively real in this case.

>What if everyone, even the gods, was answerable to divine justice at all times and all places
So you're putting something above the gods then. Some kind of overgod?

>Proof and faith are contradictory.
I hate to dismiss shit with just fedora, but that's a pretty massive fedora you're sporting. Do you think religion would suddenly be a thing because it's confirmed? I don't even begin to understand how that reasoning works. Or are you stuck on your self-imposed definition of faith which is as Twain put it "believing what you know ain't so"? Then yes, by that definition of faith there'd be no faith if it is confirmed. But that also presumes that nobody actually believes in their own religious doctrines, that we're all atheists playing pretend.

No, some sort of fate/karma sort of concept. No one deity controls it, but all are at least somewhat aware of it.

I think it’s more of a semantics definition he’s going for. I believe in tables because I know it’s real. I do not have faith in tables however. I have faith I’m not in a coma, but there is an element of doubt that I am, even though I’m reasonably sure I’m not.

It's funny how half the people in this thread seem to think that atheists don't believe in gods just because they want to be edgy contrarians, and not because the observable reality of existence seems to indicate an absence of divine beings.

>Then yes, by that definition of faith there'd be no faith if it is confirmed. But that also presumes that nobody actually believes in their own religious doctrines, that we're all atheists playing pretend.
How the fuck do you reach that conclusion? You literally saying that if you believe you don't believe.

Then it literally stops being a religion. You don't worship gravity. God and afterlife becomes just another set of laws of physics and people procedes to make religions about whatever other mysteries are left unawnsered.

Guess that makes sense. Though wouldn't that perhaps also lead to many people instead forming some kind of karma-centric philosophy (a bit like Buddhism sort of) that would lead to indifference to those gods? How would the gods react to it, to effectively being 'sidelined' while the humans mostly concern themselves with divine justice itself?

If we're going to discuss the semantics, then it's best to go back to the root word used in the New Testament (which affected how the word 'faith' and its equivalents are used in Western languages): πιστός. The word is often used in the context of a sort of trust or reliability. I guess a trivial equivalent would be those faggy trust exercises where you fall over backwards to demonstrate your faith in your partner, or in a more biblical context something like the binding of Isaac. LIke the latter example proves, objective knowledge of God does not exclude the possibility of faith or lack thereof.

>How the fuck do you reach that conclusion?
Just taking Twain's definition to its logical extreme to show it doesn't work.

I don't think you understand how stupid and stubborn people are.

>Just taking Twain's definition to its logical extreme to show it doesn't work.
No you didn't. Puting two unrelated sentences isn't logical. Also it's not Twain's definition it's what the word means.

Perhaps, but then we keep in mind people typically use faith to describe the belief in something you can’t be sure is there.

The Isaac example is showing a distinction between believing that god exists, and being willing to follow him. Like believe Donald Trump exists, but I’m not particularly inclined to care about what he says.

>I guess a trivial equivalent would be those faggy trust exercises where you fall over backwards to demonstrate your faith in your partner
If you can see the future and saw that your partner will pick you up then ypu don't have faith in your partner. You have faith in your divination skills, maybe, or if we're going by this ilogical notion in the thread that this things can be proved you have not faith at all. Faith can cause "knowledge" but faith can't be born from knowledge.

People would make a weapon using nuke technology that would not be technically a nuke. The messer is a knife, really.

Yes. Very likely.

>The Isaac example is showing a distinction between believing that god exists, and being willing to follow him. Like believe Donald Trump exists, but I’m not particularly inclined to care about what he says.
Yeah, guess that makes sense. I guess faith (and by extension also trust) require some extent of doubt being cast aside, if not about existence then at least about the person's capability or care for your wellbeing.

Only if they are aware of it, and if enlightenment is possible for humans its most likely possible for gods as well, so it is likely that a varying number of gods would have enlightenment to these karma/fate laws as well as a varying number of humans.

I wonder.

Yes, but anyone who watches them gets unavoidably divine smited to dust an hour later.

Okay, I can dig that, but what makes evil appealing?

It can't be darkness and painful hell for everyone. Maybe that could be the propaganda of the 'good' side. Is it more pop-hell? Do adherents of evil get power over damned normal souls? What kind of existence would allow damned normal souls in the first place when good and gods of good are around?

More Calexian maybe than the infinite planes of demons vs devils?

Remember, villians think they're good.

And the one who leaked them gets turned into a rooster?

>Yeah, but flat earthers are a significant minority
How I wish I could believe this. I teach high school seniors and have had no less than six outspoken flat earthers in the last two years. Five years ago they just didn't exist. Their numbers are growing.

>Their numbers are growing.
I'm guessing it's because they're more active on facebook nowadays. What's even worse is that they're legitimizing this idea of "fake news", which only gives arguments to politicians who want to control what information we can receive.

Kids don't use facebook, that's for us old fogies.

>Kids don't use facebook
WHAT?
Facebook isn't the new hotness all the cool kids are using? I... what the fuck?
Is this what being old is like? Am I really that out of touch with the youngsters? Are the memes I think are hilarious old and busted? Did Ugandan Knuckles become outdated the moment I became aware of it?

>Okay, I can dig that, but what makes evil appealing?

Evil for evil's sake is what makes evil appealing. Is how it works for settings like D&D. The Evil Incarnates are often miserable, and their minions are born into a short and ruthless life of tyranny and violence. And they can't help themselves because of the negative energies flowing inside them. And the urges.

Is like a Chaos Space Marine for a fictional example, and serial killers for real life. There is everything to lose from murdering and getting caught, but the thrill of it, which is the only reason they need to do what they do.

Jesus was about to bring Lazarus back to life and he still mourned his death.
It’s still sad, idiot.

I’d say it’s the opposite. Jesus spent time with people the public hated and treated as outcasts.
You can’t close yourself off to the rest of the world, and you can’t not associate with someone because you think you’re better than them

Unhealthy desires bring on evil. Attachment, Suffering, Resentment, all that brings on evil.

As for demons and devils, imagine beings who's soul is a shattered hollow distorted void of pure hate, malice, and every vice you can think of, imagine a being who was literally born from evil so intense it was a physical substance in the underworld that resembles reddish-black mud.

Every waking thought is one of hate, attachment, evil, chaos, and misery, every deed is motivated by greed, lust, hate, selfishness, envy, resentment, desire, pain, and fear. Demons and Devils are beings of terrifying, barbaric cruelty, who's greatest joys in life are the things more normal beings find abominations, rape, cannibalism, torture, blasphemy, defiling, the nastiest of the nasty.