Well, frankly, you have to be more specific.  People that are wrong about EVERYTHING usually end up in mental institutions.  If I was wrong about some things I would adjust my paradigm to include those new found facts, to the point that it is practical. 

I would want this being to tell us just what its plans for the population of Earth really were, if any, and to please explain why it did such a lousy job of setting up the Universe for us, and building so many flaws into our physical bodies and our mental 'machinery'.

Could it tell us if there were other self-aware beings in other parts of the Universe?

And why it kept so quiet about this for so long, leaving only what were, at best, very ambiguous 'signs' of its existence, easily accounted for by more non-supernatural causes.

Seriously.

It depends on the god. Some gods I would despise, like Yahweh, but you never know.

If that was all I knew, that 'some god' definitely exists, then I would focus all my efforts to learn about that god. It would be the most important discovery I could think of (right now, anyway). Short of neglecting my personal health, I would want to join whatever scientific team was making an effort to study this newly discovered god. Did it really create the universe, or is it more like typical gods from other religions and myths? Is it something detectable using modern instruments like a telescope, or what? Is it detectable at all? If not, then how do we know for sure it is real? Am I maybe hallucinating it? I would go to my doctor to get checked out if it turned out I was the only one who 'knew' it existed.

If there was some corroboration that this god definitely exists, then I would seriously want to know the method by which it was discovered. That would be awesome!

Then I would also have doubts, of course, if that's all I had to go on. Is this god benevolent, malevolent? Does it even know we exist? Can we communicate with it?

What has this god done that we can observe. Maybe its past behaviour will give us a clue as to whether it is dangerous or not.

How does the god work, in terms of our current theories of physics? Is it able to overcome thermodynamics, or is it also bound by those laws?

What is it made of? Ordinary matter, or something else?

Etc.

If the god somehow communicated to me, I would be very skeptical of anything it said. How would I know if it was lying or not? Without some knowledge of its past actions, it could be an evil, malevolent fuck, and the best liar in the universe. Too risky to trust blindly.

Can this god read my mind? Tell me things only I know? Can it perfectly predict the future? Can it alter the past? Can it cancel out all the suffering of the past? If so, why doesn't it?

Then I'd test out some of my favourite paradoxes. Can it create a logical impossibility? Can it perfectly predict the future, and yet somehow miraculously supply 'free will'?

Can it input to a Contradiction Machine the correct prediction of the Contradiction Machine's output (which outputs the opposite of its input, "No" if "Yes", and "Yes" if "No" )?

Etc.

After conducting your experiment with us, I would be very interested to hear the results and kinds of answers you've received on previous occasions. It's a good question, IMO.

bfish,

looking again at the OP, and other comments, it seems like you may want us to imagine ourselves suddenly acquiring a Theist mind-set. That is almost impossible, or maybe meaningless. That would not be me. So of course my life would change, but I could only guess how. Maybe to something like that of a Francis Collins, who appears to be able to accept some version of the Christian God in an otherwise capable scientific mind.

It would be like those unfortunate people who have some significant part of their brain damaged.

Proof of any specific God IS definitely impossible, so you are constructing a totally invalid scenario. My response, and that of natural, and similar, is the only reasonable one - that doesn't involve changing many fundamentals of our mental universe.

No, please don't.  That isn't interesting at all.

I am asking theists to take on an atheist mind set, that is true.  Any theist worth his salt will also argue that having his god(s) in his life is such an intrinsic part of his nature that it would be a fundamental change making him different to find out his belief was wrong.  On the other hand, anything is possible, and it is possible that a theist is wrong even if the theist is convinced that some god and particularly his god is actually there.  It is just an experiment, not a mandate that anyone actually change their beliefs.

I am not asking atheists to take a theist mind set, because a theist doesn't "know" a theist "believes."  In this case, the atheist gets to know.  There is no question of faith.  Whatever test would work for you would be met regardless of how absurd or ridiculous (if God has to walk over, introduce himself, explain himself, whatever, it is all done to your complete and total satisfaction).  

Again, the particular criteria don't matter because I'm not asking you to believe.  You would KNOW.  If it is important to you that everyone knows, then that can happen also.  You don't have to go recruit people to your new found knowledge unless you want that to be a component.  Part of the reason that the question is important is because it addresses some pretty fundamental stuff about a person.  I chose to ask the question here because I thought it would be possible that the people on this site would have the courage to actually answer (it is a hard question to answer if you have tried--nobody likes being so completely wrong about something fundamental).  

But, if you don't feel like sharing an answer then don't...I have found the answers really interesting and in a couple of weeks, I'll put up my answer as well as some others I've heard.  I didn't start with my answer because I have had a lot of time to think about it and answered it a whole bunch of times for myself.  I was worried that would bias the responses too strongly.  My conclusions from the answers that I've seen also are pretty shocking to some and expected by others, but I was hoping to get a body of answers up before sharing or revising my current conclusions from the small group I've asked directly.

Dionysus might be wimpy but without him there'd be no booze or uninhibited sex.

He could cut off all the fun and have the other gods whining in no time.

No booze, no sex... the other gods would cave in to him immediiately.

None, zip, nada.  I can not think of a single thing I would change in my life. 

Let's pretend Allah exists.  And being female, I would be supposed to cover completely (for fear of starting a frenzied orgy with my fantastic sexy body </sarcasm> ), and only go shopping with a male family member, and not drive a car, etc.  F^ck that.  Stone me.  I'd continue to wear t-shirts, no veil, short hair, a swimsuit if I wanted, drive alone, shop alone, etc.  Use my cast iron skillet on the first stupid who tried to make me conform.  No praying, no stupid stifling clothes, no limit on what I do or read or say.  I'd be dead very shortly, but I wouldn't care.

Let's pretend the Greek or Norse pantheon exists.  They are all rather entertaining gods/desses, but I wouldn't put myself out for any of them.  Not even Bacchus or Dionysus - I have been recently diagnosed as diabetic and my alcohol intake is severely limited.  Let's say the god can fix that.  Fine.  I am not interested in drinking to oblivion every day.  Boring.  Aphrodite?  You have got to be kidding.  Athene or Apollo might be interesting as they are more intellectual - but worship?  Nah.  Loki, or for that matter Coyote, is a kick, but neither of them require worship.  I could go there.

Yahweh - please.  What a jerk.  Send me to hell, please.  If I have to face eternity with Pat Robinson or Jerry Falwell or any of those other idiots, I would rather be in hell, thanks.  Which does not mean I would worship Satan. 

Would I be curious about him/her/it/them?  Nah.  I would view it as a waste of time better spent studying something/someone more interesting.

Edit - spelling and parenthesis

That sucks CJ.

If Yahweh or specifically the Christian version of him was real it wouldn't matter what I'd do as I'd be headed for the Lake of Fire anyway.

Falwell and Robinson would be in front of us in line for the fiery dip

If instead it was an eternity of torture, (unclear from the various factions of Xtians) Hell would be spending eternity with our buddy Jean. I can't imagine much worse.

I already addressed in my first response my reaction to being confronted with a God demonstrating his existence.

"Knowing" is just the strongest form of "belief". but it is still belief. You CANNOT "know" that what you "know" is true, in the silly philosophical sense of "know".

There simply is no way I could "know" that any God was 'really' the God of the Bible, since that God is claimed to have so many inherently un-observable or un-demonstrable attributes, or simply and truly impossible or meaningless or mutually contradictory ones, like all the omni- ones. So a God claiming to be such, I would interrogate as I described, and demand he explain the stories written about him, and justify or deny the atrocities, the abuse, the 1984-style mind-control attributed to him.

Otherwise I would simply ignore him, unless he insisted on forcing me to comply with his demands under actual force or threat of force or torture - which of course be a standing contradiction/denial of one of his claimed aspects, of being "Loving and merciful". Such a God is deserving of nothing but contempt.

My problem has nothing to do with the difficulty of being faced with being shown to be completely wrong about something or someone - I have confronted that from time to time already in my life. It is trying to imagine fitting something completely contradictory and inconsistent with pretty much everything else I already comprehend, which I have at least as much, and in many cases more, cause to accept than the naked claims of a 'God' entity, into my life, even if those claims are now coming directly out of the ass's mouth, so to speak. (I don't want to insult horses). My ideas about what "is" are NOT based on naked claims from authority figures.

I have personally witnessed 'magic' performances by skilled practitioners, including James Randi, so there is no way I would be impressed by someone doing something I could not explain - been there.

To repeat, my biggest problem with the Christian God, as with any of the other all-powerful ones, is not the question of their existence, it is reconciling their apparent actions, whether as claimed in the holy books, or as demonstrated in what are claimed to be their works, ie the nature and history of the world.

Those problems would still exist, just more seriously now that he apparently was 'real'.

As already mentioned by others, the Greek and Roman Gods are far more demonstrable to match their claimed attributes and behavior. Far less problems with them.

Ok, here is what I'll do. I'll take each one and answer to the best of my imagination :

If it is some invisible force/karma/energy : I would want to learn more about it, read about it, and study on it. But, I don't think my life would change at all.

If it is Yahweh : My life would not change, for I can not see myself worshipping or following such an evil bully. I would no longer be an Atheist. I would be a god-hater.

If it is the god of the Hindus : Can't see that my life would change.  I'll get reincarnated and won't remember it.

If it is the gods of the ancients, I'd pick Pan and follow him or perhaps Bes, the Egyptian version of Pan.

If it is the Wiccan god/goddess : My life would not change, I would just know that the "feelings" that I feel when the seasons change and the cycles change were alot more than just feelings.

Now of course, this is just idle speculation. It is almost like asking me what would I do if I knew the wourld were about to end in one day. I can answer that based on what I THINK I would do. But I have no real way of knowing that nor would I have any real way of knowing that unless I was actually faced with it.

If some gigantic bearded dude appeared in Times Square and said "I AM YAHWEH". I would not immediately believe it to be Yahweh. Kinda like Captain Kirk in that Star Trek movie when he said "What does god need with a starship?,".

BTW: I have yet to hear a theist on here say what they would do, if they found out that god DID NOT exist.

You take the left cheek and I'll take the right cheek.  Deal?

I think most of us here know enough about Yahweh to know that Yahweh couldn't exist and therefore is not the God in this hypothetical scenario.

 Let me just say this... if there is a God he/she has a lot of explaining to do if he/she wants to avoid me and a bunch of my intellectual friends getting violent on him/her.

You guys are crazy.  Holding a grudge or trying to get violent with an allpowerful entity is not going to have a happy ending for you.

Epic fail.

I say, let bygones be bygones.  Don't even bring that shit up.  Grab a buttcheek and start kissing.

I ain't burning for eternity over a principle.

"Yah suh!  Yah suh!   What can I do for ya suh?!?!?"

Courage will get you so far...then, in this case, it will get you in a world of eternal torment!

 I can answer this because I was a theist and now am an atheist.

My theism over decades was proven wrong to me. It was a scary time. There was first guilt and shame which religion had bestowed upon me. I had to struggle with that. The transition was not one minute I was a theist and the next an atheist. I would go back and forth and ask what if I am wrong again I could burn in eternal hell fires. But in time I moved from that position more fully convinced that in particular a evil god like Jehovah didn't exist. If there was one then it would be more of a deistic god. I had feelings of being more alone and that was sad but it didn't last long. I started become interested in evolution and it really excited me. Here I had been rejecting science for so long and now this stuff just made sense. It opened a new vast world to me. It still thrills me and explains the world in an incredible and useful way. Stepping back just a bit I find going out at night, which I do with my dogs, I look up at the vastness of the sky and ponder. In my religious thinking I was afraid because I believed in the devil and demons. I was impressed with the sky for sure and hoped that soon Jesus would return and destroy all the evil. In my de-conversion I said "Well Jesus if you are there let me know". As time progressed I came to a place where there was no fear of these invisible forces. How are Jesus and the Devil alike? Both will fuck you up, but one says he loves you. Now I look in amazement of the universe.  How remote and tiny we are. It was quite inspiring. The fear of those things is gone.

But the big surprise for me because I was told this by religious people that I would become this immoral person. My morals have not shifted one iota. In fact I would say they have improved because I am directly honest. As a Christian I had to hide my doubts and project the agenda. I don't have to do that know. I don't have to have an answer for everything.

OK.

I cannot imagine myself going back the other direction, back to theism, because it took decades to get here. But if I did...hmmm....I would assume the new god would be quite different than the old one. I might like him better. Damn I would hope so. The change would be to try to figure out who he is and what he requires.  The results of that study would change me, but as from the above conversion I would still be me. Honest and moral.

I don't see a problem with being a drug lord. Most of the "bad" things associated with drugs (murder, assault, theft, disease, etc.) are actually a byproduct of their illicit nature than a byproduct of the existence of drugs.
There are obviously exceptions. Heroin, cocaine, crystal meth, and others have significantly serious consequences beyond their legality, but many of those consequences could still be mitigated via support, while using threat merely inspires deceptive and avoidal behaviours.

I'm 60 freaking years old.  I have compromised most of my life, doing things I don't want to do for the sake of family and holding household.  I'm done.  I am doing what I want when I want.  If god/s/dess doesn't like it, they can kiss my ass or stomp me to smoosh.  I don't care about them and I have lived long enough to not get freaky over being dead.

Our main difference is probably due to the age of our children.  You have a ways to go before yours are grown up.  My youngest is 33.  My grandson is 15, older than your daughter.  I would like to see if I am going to have great-grandchildren, but if I don't make it, I don't.  I understand your feelings of wanting to stay around for a daughter who still needs you.  Doesn't make you or me crazy.

Watcher,

I don't see us 'throwing out an illogical viewpoint" - it is really an 'illogical' proposition we are being asked to address.

And evolution is NOT about 'extending your existence', it is about how successfully you are at generating offspring, or helping others to reproduce.

Since you have already reproduced, 'evolution' now 'cares' less about you than before. In quite a few species, the male dies soon after mating. That is fine with 'evolution'.

And if by any chance there is some other species potentially coming along which your existence is in the way of, then 'evolution' may well be 'helped' by your early termination.

So apart from any comments on the "proven God" scenario. Your comment concerning evolution is very 'illogical'.

Confronting an allegedly ultra powerful being may well be ill-advised, if your main desire is to continue to live, but if you regard ethical/moral principles and opposing evil to be high values, and maybe would like to be remembered for that, rather than as an ass-licker, then it may be the more moral and principled course of action. Logic works in both scenarios - depends what your personal desires and purposes are. If you think you should survive to protect your children, that is a very reasonable position also.

K. But instead of contributing to the atheistcore stereotype of being bitter at humanity's current situ, you seem to contribute to the pigeon hole (pun!) that atheists are basically people bitter about going to church/mosque/synogogue/temple, or that we are not atheists so much as people bitter at everyone else's imaginary sky buddy.

What I would give to shatter such a meaningless illusion...

Sorry, evolution is NOT about "extending your existence".

It is definitely about reproduction.

Social species such as ourselves do indeed allow non-reproducing individuals to contribute to maximizing successful reproduction, but it is still about reproduction. Period.

Any extension of life-span which allows individuals to continue to make positive contributions, directly or indirectly, to successful reproduction of their lineage, their genes, or the genes of their relatives, is going to be favoured by evolution. Otherwise it is just a side effect of some other characteristic.

Similarly, any characteristics, such as reasoning ability and other 'higher level' functionality that ultimately allow us to have more kids are going to be favoured by evolution.

But if they also allow us to devise more and more destructive weapons which we use in expressing our evolved drive for competition with other groups, or other 'clever' technologies that allow us to destroy our own environment, evolution may ultimately eliminate us as representing a blind alley.

To quote Arthur C. Clarke: "It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value."

You know, Bob.  It wouldn't hurt you to at least say hi to me.

I know we're having this world hanging in the balance internet debate but dude, do you remember me?

Remember when I caught you on skype and started asking you all kinds of questions like had you ever seen a duck-billed platypus in the wild?

Gawd, now I just reminded myself that I've never seen a Platypus in real life.  Argh.  I want to see a real platypus.

Darn tooting.  And don't you forget it.

I have never been one to go along to get along.  It just isn't me.  And to me, it feels more irrational to kiss ass than to tell god/s/dess up yours.  I found this out taking an ethics class years ago.  One of the "ethical dilemmas" is do you have free will when someone is pointing a gun at your head, saying, "Jump off the Grand Canyon cliff other there or I will shoot you."  My response is sure, I have choices.  I can jump, stand still and get shot, or I can run, or I can attempt to take the gun away from the nut case, or ....  In short, I don't hold still for bullies.

And any god/s/dess who says, kiss my ass or fry for eternity is a bully.  I don't have to kiss ass, rational or not.  I don't have to be rational 100% of the time.  I am human and at least occasional irrationality comes with the package.  I have also been known to be self-contradictory and to have cheerfully admitted that I was, and to assert that I saw no reason to resolve the contradiction. 

Am I angry?  Perhaps.  Any rational person should be.  Take one omni-god/s/dess and look around at the mess that has been allowed to propagate on this world.  This is a plan?  This is intelligent?  As long as I am certain god/s/dess does not, can not exist, I don't have to waste my time and energy on anger.  But have him/her/it/them show up and I get to be angry.  Very angry. 

I can not conceive of hell and eleventy-bazillion years of torment.  But then, I can't conceive of playing a harp on fluffy clouds that long, either. 

Bitter about not having a job, maybe. Or at least that is what I perceive.

You are probably correct in that maybe you don't feel bitter, and it isn't necessarily your problem what people assume sometimes, but believers are still going to do it if my personal experience with them is any indicator. Hell, I don't even need personal experience for this. They do it openly and publicly, but it's difficult to tell if this is simply petty denial or genuine ignorance, or even something altogether different.

I still, as of yet, have not heard one resident theist say how they would react if they found out that there WAS NOT a god.

Any theists out there willing to tackle this question ? (Hopefully not Jean Chauvin, I am past the point of giving a shit what he has to say. )

Way to get side tracked.....

So, I haven't seen one at a fauna park (zoo? zoological gardens?).  I've been to a couple of large zoos on the west coast, no platypi - platypuses - whosis - or even monotremes.  Now I have to go look it up.  Where is the nearest - or any - platypus exhibit in North America?