flood-4
Original: flood-4 on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1
Woman: Hey God, how can you render judgment on people based on their moral status only at death?
God (purple bubble): What?
Panel 2
Woman: Like some people are good their whole lives then transgress. Others are bad their whole lives then return to you. But you only judge at a random instant, sending some to eternal perdition.
Panel 3
God (purple bubble): Oh, that's basic game theory.
Panel 4
God: Look at ranchers. They shoot a guy for stealing a single cow. Why? Because cows roam a lot and it's hard to police the whole territory.
God: The only way to thwart bad behavior is either to monitor everything or just inflict massively disproportionate punishment on anyone unlucky enough to get caught.
Panel 5 (narrow panels, characters only)
Panel 6
God: If everybody goes to heaven, I gotta run around stopping fornicators and gluttons and sluggards all day long which is frankly boring and degrading.
Panel 7
Woman: But don't you exist in a world beyond time where the measure of eternity is as a single moment?
God (purple bubble): Thaaaaaaaaaat's why y'all are so confused down there.
Votey:
The woman (in a purple speech bubble): I don't even get weekends off up here.
Woman: Hey God, how can you render judgment on people based on their moral status only at death?
God (purple bubble): What?
Panel 2
Woman: Like some people are good their whole lives then transgress. Others are bad their whole lives then return to you. But you only judge at a random instant, sending some to eternal perdition.
Panel 3
God (purple bubble): Oh, that's basic game theory.
Panel 4
God: Look at ranchers. They shoot a guy for stealing a single cow. Why? Because cows roam a lot and it's hard to police the whole territory.
God: The only way to thwart bad behavior is either to monitor everything or just inflict massively disproportionate punishment on anyone unlucky enough to get caught.
Panel 5 (narrow panels, characters only)
Panel 6
God: If everybody goes to heaven, I gotta run around stopping fornicators and gluttons and sluggards all day long which is frankly boring and degrading.
Panel 7
Woman: But don't you exist in a world beyond time where the measure of eternity is as a single moment?
God (purple bubble): Thaaaaaaaaaat's why y'all are so confused down there.
Votey:
The woman (in a purple speech bubble): I don't even get weekends off up here.
Alt text
A four-panel-tall SMBC comic. A woman talks with God, whose dialogue appears in purple-outlined speech bubbles coming from off-panel. The woman asks how God can judge people based only on their moral status at the moment of death, since some people are good their whole lives then transgress while others are bad then repent, yet judgment lands at a random instant that can send someone to eternal perdition. God replies that it's basic game theory, comparing it to ranchers who shoot someone for stealing a single cow because cattle roam widely and the territory is hard to police: the only way to thwart bad behavior is to either monitor everything or inflict massively disproportionate punishment on whoever unlucky person gets caught. God adds that if everyone went to heaven, he'd have to run around all day stopping fornicators, gluttons, and sluggards, which is boring and degrading. The woman points out that God exists beyond time, where all of eternity is as a single moment, and God exclaims 'Thaaaaaaaaaat's why y'all are so confused down there.' Votey: the woman, now in a purple bubble, complains 'I don't even get weekends off up here.'
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.