For the purposes of this debate (a) God has just shown itself to all of humanity. Has announced that most religions are getting as much wrong as they are getting right. While every person sees God slightly differently for our purposes God is a talking ball of light.

Religion has no place in this debate. The sudden proof of the existence of a higher being is the purpose of this debate.

Questions for debate:

If you do not believe there is a God now would apologize admit you were wrong to those you have disagreed with?

If you do believe there is a God now would you be all I told you so!

What about what you believe (besides that there is a God) would change?

You have 10 minutes with God - What do you say? Ask?

If you do not believe there is a God now would apologize to those you have disagreed with?

I would not apologize at all. I would just admit to being wrong.

If you do believe there is a God now would you be all I told you so!

NA

What about what you believe (besides that there is a God) would change?

I don't think you can answer this without getting into faith issue. For starters we would have to know the nature of the God that had just presented himself/herself/itself. What if it were not the god of the Bible, perhaps something more like ET?

You have 10 minutes with God - What do you say? Ask?

1. Why have you been hiding so long.

2. I'd like to talk to Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Could you be so kind as to summons them?

3. This is getting a little boring. Could you create an instant Chuck Berry concert? Could you fix my arthritic legs and make a young woman out of one of my ribs for me to dance with?

4. Oh yeah. I used to be a league bowler. I'd like to meet Pete Weber.

Humor aside, I just realized talking to "god" in the physical would be pretty much the typical self-centered prayer.

I have amended my topic on your suggestions/points.

If a God showed up, I'd definitely have something to say to non-believers. However, if God said that we had it all wrong, I don't suppose that would matter. Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised. Considering how people over time have used religion to manipulate respective populations, I wouldn't raise an eye brow if we'd messed it up along the way.

It's hard for a Christian to think about something changing about our belief in God, particularly due to how we view the next coming. However, it might clear up some thoughts on what God looks like.

As far as 10 minutes with God, I suppose I'd be Thankful. Thankful for being born in this nation, for being given gifts that have helped me be successful (even if in moderation), for having a loving wife and family, for the happiness that I've been lucky enough to have, and for the health that I've had to date. I might also hope to find meaning in the lessons that life teaches us all, and discuss the feelings/actions that have caused myself (and humanity I'd suppose) regret.

Then if life on earth was over as we knew it... I'd get a frosty mug and a Shiner Light for the trip out. (ok, maybe the whole six pack and a coozie.)

If you do not believe there is a God now would apologize to those you have disagreed with?

Not really- not at all. I have done some things I am not proud of, and would like to say "I am sorry for being an idiot there"- IF he/she turns out to be into that sort of thing-

Most likely- I would give him/her a piece of my mind for his/her followers being such scumbags, and why haven't you smited them?

If you do believe there is a God now would you be all I told you so!

I am personally an agnostic diest- I don't blame others for not believing, because Gawd has been REALLY REALLY following down on the job- pretty darn incompetant in fact. Need to work on that big time.

What about what you believe (besides that there is a God) would change?

Poeple would take even LESS responsible for thier behavior, and that would really torque me off.

You have 10 minutes with God - What do you say? Ask?

Where the hell have you been? You know that there is a bunch of work to do you slacker? Why haven't you smited the right wing yet? Are you just a lazy slob or do you just shirk your duties for fun?

If he/she is REALLY the creator, and I am in your image- what the hell were you thinking?

If you do not believe there is a God now would apologize admit you were wrong to those you have disagreed with?

Depends on the nature of the talking ball of light claiming to be a god.

What about what you believe (besides that there is a God) would change?

At the very least, it would change my opinion regarding our status as a species at the top of the food chain - so to speak. Beyond that, I can't say... see above.

You have 10 minutes with God - What do you say? Ask?

Well, I might write down a few things before hand. I would ask this god to move closer so that I could use the light to read by.

I might ask:

So... how's it going? Where've you been? Been having a good laugh? Are we an experiment? Do you need to plug in to a socket somewhere to recharge? How many watts is truth? Where can I get a glowing ball of light suit? Do they come in XL? That sort of thing.

If you do not believe there is a God now would apologize admit you were wrong to those you have disagreed with?

I would have nothing to apologise to anyone for, except possibly God, since disagreement and argument are healthy (this is a debate board, after all).

If I (or you) had ever persecuted anyone based on their beliefs, and were later proven to be wrong, and them right, then an apology to them would be in order. Otherwise, no.

I'd admit I'm wrong in the face of undeniable evidence that proved me so, yes. I wouldn't enjoy the process much, but who does? But I'd have to admit I was wrong - that's the thing about us secular rationalists, we do end up fitting our worldviews to the evidence, since that is the rationalist worldview - don't believe anything that isn't evidence based.

If a deity were to spontaneously call itself into existence for long enough to pronounce to the whole universe "listen, I didn't exist before just now, and when I've finished talking I won't exist again for all etenrity. I just spontaneously called myself into existence to say that all the religious people are wrong, and I don't exist, and life and the universe really is a random series of probabilities taking place under accidentally appropriate laws of physics, so stop waiting for me to come and make everything better in your life, or the imaginary one you think you might get afterwards that you invented to allow yourselves to put up with stuff you don't like about this one, and start treating one another, and the rest of the universe, with the respect they and it deserve", religious people wouldn't have to apologise to anyone just for being wrong.

But I daresay they'd find a lot more reasons to fit the evidence to their worldview - because that, almost by definition, is what you have to do when your worldview is based upon faith. "It wasn't God, it was the devil/ a rationalist trick". Or "It was a test of faith". Or, "it wasn't my God who was saying He/She doesn't exist, but his over there". I can easily imagine most religious people coming up with these in the face of hard evidence that there is no God; any number of explanations why they can carry on believing as before and ignore what's in front of their noses.

Mind you, I can't imagine what the evidence of absence of a phenomenon, for which there is little or no real evisence in the first place, might be.

If you do believe there is a God now would you be all I told you so!
Doesn't apply.

What about what you believe (besides that there is a God) would change?
Not very much about the world at large.

The believers in whichever particular deity was represented by the talking shiny thing would become even more insufferably convinced of their own righteousness.

After some suitable period of chastened humility at their telling off over the stuff they've got wrong, it can only be hoped.

But I'd wager it would take the form of "Yes God, we're really sorry we ignored that stuff about pork and shellfish being unclean, and spent so much time hating and killing people who believe slightly different things about you, but at least you're saying Jesus/Mohammed/the Flying Spaghetti Monster is your true representative on Earth, so we were right about that bit, and like all righteous people, we like nothing better than to be proven right. Take that, all your doubters/infidels/unbelievers. Now we've got an extra excuse to smite you on behalf of our newly awakened faith, especially now that the ten minutes are up and our God has gone away from his talking light manifestation again, so He won't be able to tell us off again if we're mean to you."

And believers in the faiths who turned out to be wrong (or just to have misinterpreted the talking ball of light's message more dramatically than most) would probably find ways of blaming the appearance on the devil, tests of faith, et cetera as before.

Most agnostics would become believers, provided they didn't actually have to turn up at a place of worship or change their lifestyle or anything.

Some atheists would persist in their unbelief, because for them their non-belief is a kind of belief in itself (they'd be like the proven-wrong faiths; they'd spend all their energy thinking of reasons why the ball of light was a parlour trick of some kind, designed to con the gullible and the weak).

I believe, most atheists are like me, though - rationalists that are only functionally atheists because there is no solid evidence that God exists, and even less that this particular faith or that one is the one He wants us to follow (they all claim to be, but not all of them can be). Present them, and me, with completely solid, repeatable evidence that we can witness with our own senses (better still if we can do it in a double-blind trial), and we'll find it hard not to believe.

You have 10 minutes with God - What do you say? Ask?

Lots of things, mostly in respect of my scepticism:
1. Who or what created you?
2. What's this big thing you have about being worshipped? Why should an omnipotent omniscient super-being be so insecure?
3. Why are you so hooked on irrational belief - you'd have a lot more followers if you gave some tangible and above-all incontrovertible evidence that you exist. Most of the really smart, people, to begin with *
For example, you could have done the whole talking ball of light thing all along, instead of only appearing to small groups of people, or single individuals, in poorly corroborated events that mostly took place 1500+ years ago.
4. Why create suffering, hatred, etc? Is the free choice to be good and to worship you so important to you that the choice to do nasty things that go against everything you say you want people to do, and on a vastly larger scale, is worth the payoff?
5. What really happens after we die? Please don't demonstrate, explain.
6. Please make it easier for us to understand you. If you pass beyond understanding, why not make us smart enough to catch up? Or just explain yourself in simpler terms? Why make us sentient enough to want to understand, but not sentient enough to understand? In other words, faith?

Reading those back, I guess most of my questions revolve around not really getting why any deity would create a creature, and demand it's love and loyalty, but refuse to give any reason to do so beyond "because I say so", which requires the believer to have faith. I don't get why faith is necessary, beyond some kind of supernatural egotism.

Put it this way, I can imagine it might be a huge kick to a man who could breed a new type of ant that could do his bidding, or even just all acknowledge his presence in some kind of antish worship. However, I can't imagine what the ants might get out of it.

* Ok, so maybe now I have something to apologize for.

If you do not believe there is a God now would apologize admit you were wrong to those you have disagreed with?

I'd both apologize and admit I was wrong even though I do believe a God exists. The ball of light is either perfect or not God. I am human and imperfect; therefore, in contrast to any perfect God, I am inherently wrong about his nature, even if I've got parts of it right.

If you do believe there is a God now would you be all I told you so!

I hope not. I know my own belief is incomplete. My faith is weak, at best. Little would separate me from a disbeliever in the presence of true perfection. I hope I would not respond with despair, defiance, or pride, but only humility. Whatever my response, it couldn't be the right one. I admire those who would respond with pure joy untainted by pride, but I doubt I would be among them.

What about what you believe (besides that there is a God) would change?

If he cared to make me understand his ways perfectly, no matter how right about him I may think I am, I will find I have been more than 90% wrong. So, it would be nearly as revolutionary for me as one who didn't believe.

You have 10 minutes with God - What do you say? Ask?

"Please have mercy on me, though I do not deserve it." If the Christians are right about God, I'll get an eternity with God if he responds in the affirmative, so if I've only got ten minutes, I'm probably on my way to the bad place. Otherwise, my follow up might be "please tell me as much as you can in the next 9 minutes that would help me spend the remainder of my existence in the best way possible".