# Would it bother you if evil people made it into heaven? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 17, 2019, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775 "2019-08-17T00:54:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2019, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/41 "2019-08-19T23:22:47Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > I have been fundamentally altered throughout my entire life. I was far more limited when I was a toddler than I am now, yet both are still me. Regardless of how it appears on the outside, my conscious experience is that those were all me. > > I see no reason this would change no matter how much I was altered. This is true whether I go to heaven, and experience eternal bliss, or I wind up augmenting my human body with cyberpunk technology. > > I’m all about the continuity of consciousness. If you have it, no matter what else is true, you experience being the same person. And this is fundamentally true, yet cannot be measured. I agree with this. How do you feel about teleporters or mind back-ups? 😉 > [@Saintly\_Loser](#): > > From my Catholic perspective, universal salvation cannot be ruled out. It is certainly to be hoped for. Mystics (for example, Julian of Norwich in the fourteenth century) and theologians (Karl Rahner in the twentieth century) have expressed a belief in universal salvation. I, personally, share this belief. > > At the very least, the only souls not saved are those that knowingly and consciously refuse salvation. This might apply to Lucifer and other fallen angels – you know, “better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven.” But I don’t believe it can apply to any human. > > So, no, it wouldn’t bother me that those who are “undeserving” make it to paradise. It would only confirm my belief in God’s infinite love for His creation. I would like this to be the case as well. I once had a colleague who was a former Catholic priest _(he left the priesthood because he met someone)_ and had a similar discussion to this with him, I can’t recall his exact answers but he was definitely more on the conservative side of the religious spectrum. > [@begbert2](#): > > I have extreme confidence in the ability of evil people to do evil, which means that my experience in heaven would have to include solidly locking doors so I could keep evil people (and innocent children) from wandering in and messing with me and my stuff - sure the baddie will be removed for a while afterward, but the damage will already have been done. And of course if I can lock my door then I’m really creating my own exclusionary heaven, all by myself. > > What, you’re saying that in heaven I don’t get to have stuff of my own? That’s hell! > > Of course the other way (the _only_ other way) to prevent evil from doing evil to me would be to do a little involuntary mind rewiring to make it so I don’t mind insults, beatings, robbery, vandalism, imprisonment, or being cut off in traffic. And if you do do mind rewiring then I never get to go to heaven at all; instead there’ll just be some other dude in there stealing my identity. > [@Icarus](#): > > So, fundamentally you are proposing a Heaven where one can be in a bothered state? As someone mentioned above if heaven exists it would be a state of existence we can’t really comprehend from our current perspective. I only wrote the ‘being shown around part’ to set the scenario and if it would bother you that the ‘undeserving’ were there as well, not really to define the nature of heaven itself _(other than its a really neat place)_. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2019, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/42 "2019-08-19T23:47:35Z")
> [@Atomic\_Alex](#): > > As someone mentioned above if heaven exists it would be a state of existence we can’t really comprehend from our current perspective. I only wrote the ‘being shown around part’ to set the scenario and if it would bother you that the ‘undeserving’ were there as well, not really to define the nature of heaven itself _(other than its a really neat place)_. As an atheist, I’m not inclined to shrug off critically important aspects of the question. So I have little choice but to make deductions about the heaven in question. If we presume brainwashing everybody to be nice/happy/mindless lumps is off the table, really the only way to avoid people bothering each other would be to keep them apart from one another. Classic scenario: Fred isn’t happy unless he’s smooching Alice. Alice doesn’t want to be smooched by Fred and isn’t happy when he’s smooching her. (She’s not fond of the stalking and peeping, either.) They both end up in heaven. How can they both be happy? Logically speaking, something’s got to break - Either one of Fred and Alice doesn’t get what they want, or perhaps Fred is completely removed/eliminated. Or perhaps you put them inside separate simulations where Fred can mack on fake-Alice to his heart’s content while Alice enjoys an undisturbed experience of bon-bons and seltzer. This pretty much covers the available options - unless you confine or restrict Fred in a way that will render him unhappy. If I were Alice and discovered that Fred was macking on a superrealdoll of me, I’d be less than pleased. It makes _perfect sense_ that I’d be less than pleased. So in that scenario I couldn’t honestly say that I’d be okay with Fred enjoying his version of heaven, even if it didn’t effect me directly. ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/43 "2019-08-20T15:11:07Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > really the only way to avoid people bothering each other would be to keep them apart from one another. This reminds me of C.S. Lewis’s “The Great Divorce” - where this was actually Hell (and any torture was people torturing themselves basically). ---
**Author:** ![Taber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac91a4/32.png) [@Taber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taber)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2019, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/44 "2019-08-20T21:41:17Z")
If you asked me to pick an ideally just afterlife, from bits and pieces of the Christian afterlife, it would be good people going to heaven and bad people go to purgatory and eventually make it into heaven through reform and rehabilitation. Everyone just making it to heaven isn’t exactly the same, but is pretty close, and certainly closer than eternal torture. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/45 "2019-08-21T02:35:25Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > I have been fundamentally altered throughout my entire life. I was far more limited when I was a toddler than I am now, yet both are still me. > > Regardless of how it appears on the outside, my conscious experience is that those were all me. Like many other people, I have [no reliable memories whatsoever of the time when I was a toddler](https://www.livescience.com/63109-first-memory-fictional.html), so in terms of my own “conscious experience”, I have absolutely no way of knowing whether “both are still me”. The same is probably true for you, perhaps excepting a couple of isolated genuine memories of experiences between the ages of two and three. And even the vast changes from human infancy to human adulthood are infinitesimal, ISTM, compared to the changes that would be required to turn a mortal physical human being into some kind of immortal perfected spirit entity. > [@BigT](#): > > I’m all about the continuity of consciousness. If you have it, no matter what else is true, you experience being the same person. Well, you don’t have “continuity of consciousness” even for the full duration of your own human lifetime, given that you have no conscious awareness of having been an infant and none or very little of having been a toddler. And I’m extremely skeptical about (evidence-free) claims that an immortal-perfected-spirit “me” would really “experience being the same person” in any way that would be recognizable to actual-mortal-human me. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/46 "2019-08-21T11:58:25Z")
There’s an assumption built into this question that there is such a thing as “being evil” which is defined as “having done a thing that makes you unworthy of compassion and love.” I don’t think that such people exist, therefore, I would be totally fine sharing space in an ideal, forever future with these so-called “evil” people. ---
**Author:** ![Moris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moris/32/2846_2.png) [@Moris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moris)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/47 "2019-08-21T13:16:14Z")
In any version of “heaven” where I need to be “rewired” not to be unhappy and not to commit any sins, basically being a enslaved mind-zombie in a dull place for eternity, that heaven is basically hell. The only way heaven could work is for 100 billiion dead there’s 100 billion individual heavens, everyone around you from Hitler to Gandhi being a spiritual simulacra, your own prop for your own theatre play. Any conversation, any depicting of Jesus or Aristotle will be uniquely yours, and you always keep the right to be unhappy. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/48 "2019-08-21T14:03:41Z")
Clearly, there are people for whom Heaven cannot be Heaven unless they can feel superior to others while simultaneously wallowing in self-inflicted unhappiness. Sounds more like Hell to me and I suspect they are already living this life in that Hell. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/49 "2019-08-21T14:19:53Z")
> [@Moris](#): > > In any version of “heaven” where I need to be “rewired” not to be unhappy and not to commit any sins, You are constantly being rewired in real life. Do you hold the same beliefs and attitudes as you did when you were a child? An adolescent? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/50 "2019-08-21T14:51:10Z")
Being rewired to have the same limited set of emotions as everyone else? Having the part of my brain that contains empathy, regret, sorrow etc. permanently blocked? To have what makes us individuals taken away? No, thank you-The price for this artificially induced joy is too high for my tastes. ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/51 "2019-08-21T16:32:02Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > There’s an assumption built into this question that there is such a thing as “being evil” which is defined as “having done a thing that makes you unworthy of compassion and love.” I don’t think that such people exist, therefore, I would be totally fine sharing space in an ideal, forever future with these so-called “evil” people. I have never heard ‘evil’ defined in that way and a quick google search doesn’t bring up anyone else using that definition. That said as long as they learn to play nice with others and hopefully at least have some remorse for their actions I would have no issue sharing paradise with people who did evil actions in this life. After all if the afterlife is real its literally not my place to judge. But again its hard to think of a heaven that could have any real relation to mortal life for that to function correctly. > [@Scumpup](#): > > Clearly, there are people for whom Heaven cannot be Heaven unless they can feel superior to others while simultaneously wallowing in self-inflicted unhappiness. Sounds more like Hell to me and I suspect they are already living this life in that Hell. It seems to come down to two different attitudes, some people are OK with ‘its ineffable and mysterious and we can’t really understand or imagine it from our earthly perspective but we lose nothing of ourselves and only gain from the transition’. Other people can’t accept this, which is fine, they aren’t necessarily wrong but I do think they’re trying to map our current mortal perspective onto what would be a different state of existence entirely. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/52 "2019-08-21T18:07:28Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Being rewired to have the same limited set of emotions as everyone else? Having the part of my brain that contains empathy, regret, sorrow etc. permanently blocked? To have what makes us individuals taken away? > No, thank you-The price for this artificially induced joy is too high for my tastes. What emotions outside the same limited set everyone has do you believe you have now? IAC, I sincerely wish you as much unhappiness as necessary to make you feel fulfilled. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/53 "2019-08-21T18:12:45Z")
Heaven = ‘Free Beer Today!’ Hell = ‘Free Beer Tomorrow!’ ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/54 "2019-08-21T18:25:05Z")
> [@Atomic\_Alex](#): > > So, would it bother you that those who are in your opinion undeserving make it to paradise, sinners just as much as saints? That everyone gets the same reward? Nope. I’ll just consider myself lucky to be there and that’s that. Although, I might actually be pleased to see people not having to spend eternity being cruelly punished for mean stuff they did over the course of a few years. > [@Atomic\_Alex](#): > > …I do think they’re trying to map our current mortal perspective onto what would be a different state of existence entirely. I don’t give them that much credit. I simply think most adults never realize a level of maturity beyond the toddler who screams, “No fair!” ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/55 "2019-08-21T18:25:55Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > What emotions outside the same limited set everyone has do you believe you have now? > IAC, I sincerely wish you as much unhappiness as necessary to make you feel fulfilled. You can’t have happiness without unhappiness to rise from. You can’t have joy without overcoming sorrow. You strive to do better because of regret of not having done good enough in the first place. It is the ups and downs of life, the variety, that makes this life worth living as far as I’m concerned. BTW, your recent responses to my posts make me doubt that you actually want me anywhere near your version of heaven anyway. Way to represent. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2019, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/56 "2019-08-21T18:45:19Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > You can’t have happiness without unhappiness to rise from. You can’t have joy without overcoming sorrow. Or if in some supernatural afterlife you actually **can** have those things, as I said, that’s so contrary to fundamental human nature that it isn’t really meaningful to describe the pre-death actual human and the afterlife eternally-blissful spirit as being the “same person”. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2019, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/57 "2019-08-22T01:26:08Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > You can’t have happiness without unhappiness to rise from. That is one of the more bullshit assertions, ever. I’ll require some expansion beyond your good say-so on it…and expansion, in this context, means more than your tired-ass idea of Socratic method. ---
**Author:** ![Biffster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biffster/32/339_2.png) [@Biffster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffster)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2019, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/58 "2019-08-22T04:23:14Z")
It seems to me the OP’s original question has more to do with how much of our earthly baggage can we leave behind when we enter the great hereafter. Seems to me if we can’t let go of our petty earthly jealousies, we’re really not quite ready for the great hereafter. There is no peace without forgiveness. And I believe that includes forgiving ourselves of our own wrongs. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2019, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/59 "2019-08-22T04:47:16Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > That is one of the more bullshit assertions, ever. I’ll require some expansion beyond your good say-so on it…and expansion, in this context, means more than your tired-ass idea of Socratic method. Require away-You can keep, and enjoy, your Heaven…although if it as you describe you won’t have much choice in the matter. Although it interests me slightly to know if you consider convincing me not to capitulate as a loss, or a win. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2019, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775/60 "2019-08-22T10:10:54Z")
As long as they stay away from me, whatever. My perception of what heaven is supposed to be, your own personal paradise as you deem it, means I’ll have the power to be alone when I want, with companions when I want, and with family when I want. It’ll be like controlling your dreams. So if somehow I had awareness of everywhere else, and it bothered me (if it was possible to be bothered by things in this fantastical perfect place), I could shut it all out of view. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-it-bother-you-if-evil-people-made-it-into-heaven/838775.md?page=4)