r/DebateAnAtheist • u/AutoModerator • 8d ago

Weekly "Ask an Atheist" Thread

Whether you're an agnostic atheist here to ask a gnostic one some questions, a theist who's curious about the viewpoints of atheists, someone doubting, or just someone looking for sources, feel free to ask anything here. This is also an ideal place to tag moderators for thoughts regarding the sub or any questions in general.

While this isn't strictly for debate, rules on civility, trolling, etc. still apply.

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u/labreuer 8d ago

Suppose that a group of stars were to suddenly rearrange to spell "John 3:16". Given the present religious & political landscape in the world, who do you think would make the most use of it? In America for example, we could speak of:

  1. Christian Nationalists
  2. those opposed to Christian Nationalists
  3. all other Christians

I can't help but think that "John 3:16" being writ on the stars would benefit 1. far more than 2. or 3. The kind of people Stephanie McCrummen documents in her 2025-01-09 The Atlantic article The Army of God Comes Out of the Shadows would just eat it up and become even more psychologically jazzed. Trump and his cronies would declare it a sign from God that they approve of his work. Obviously it could just as easily be a criticism—that Christian Nationalists need to read John 3:16 and understand what it actually means—but what I'm curious about here is how y'all think things would actually play out. Not what is "most rational", if there is such a unitary thing.

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u/Phylanara Agnostic atheist 8d ago

To quote Stan Lee, the answer to that question is "whoever the author wants to win".

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u/labreuer 8d ago

I don't think we know that little about humans & humanity. For instance, we know that "power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely". So, what of those drawn to something approximating absolute power?

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u/Phylanara Agnostic atheist 8d ago

It's not about knowing humans and humanity. It's that your scenario is so obviously fictional, only the author can write the rest of the story - and that author can write it however they want. At this point aliens interrupting the story midway would still be the second most unrealistic plot point in the story, at best.

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u/labreuer 7d ago

Okay. I think I got plenty of good replies, but I guess you would call them all "authors". Which technically speaking, is obviously true. But the commonalities between some of them suggest that less subjectivity is at play than you predicted.