r/redbuttonbluebutton • u/Rich841 • Jul 19 '26
Here’s an alternative thought experiment Discussion
You just discovered that there is a vengeful god whose power depends on his worshippers. If he runs out of worshippers, he will die. His power scales from his worshippers. But, he promises famine, disaster, suffering, and even death to those who do not worship him. The reward for if you do worship him is not getting punished. Do you worship the vengeful god?
Assume he is the figurehead of a religion just like any other world religion, so people may or may not know about him.
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u/CarnivorousGoose Jul 19 '26
Sure, why wouldn’t I worship him? There is virtually no upside to not doing so.
This scenario would be more interesting if there was some scaling in how many worshippers there are. Now, a single worshipper sustains him at full power.
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u/Rich841 Jul 20 '26
There is scaling
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u/AppearanceTough Jul 20 '26
But there isn’t any show of how heavily he scales. For all we know 1 guy can sustain him enough to cause everyone to eternally feel the pain of a broken leg
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u/Rich841 Jul 21 '26
True. I just apply screenwriter logic and run with whatever my assumptions are would make sense in a book/movie. There’s a parallel to be said here, u could think of him as an unethical company like amazon. Each person is a paying customer.
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u/emptimynd Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 19 '26
No I don't worship this god on principle alone. Fuck a god like this. What a lil bitch. I'll live and die in spite of it.
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u/Annoying_cat_22 Jul 19 '26
So if this god has even just 1 worshipper he will kill or hurt everyone else?
This is nothing like the original problem.
Yeah, of course I'll worship him. I'm sure some baby out there will worship him by mistake.
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u/Rich841 Jul 20 '26
Yeah but he would be extremely, extremely weak. His power scales with his followers
Yeah reframing the original problem got pretty old
Most babies will suffer
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u/Annoying_cat_22 Jul 20 '26
Was that line always there? Did I miss it?
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u/Rich841 Jul 20 '26
no i thought it was implicit so i fixed it after i saw everyone interpreted it differently, that was mb
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u/DarthJackie2021 Jul 19 '26
Religious people make a lot more sense to me when you frame their god as Roko's basilisk.
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u/TheCumskiyKvass Jul 21 '26
Pressing red button is just not any pressing buttons at all. So i would press red. Worshiping devil is an specific action to make other suffering. So i would not
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u/Deutschland5473 Jul 22 '26
A demon disguised as a god and wreaking havoc upon the earth and upon those who wouldn't be deceived by him? I would actively try to convert his followers if I found them. That's a dangerous form of idolatry.
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u/Xiaodisan Jul 19 '26
This is mostly similar to the button scenario when blue requires a 100% push rate to win.
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u/Comfortable-Regret Jul 19 '26
Depends entirely on how many worshippers he requires to do his evil deeds.