Pascal's wager

Sorry but in in most branches (actually all I know) of Christianity, belief is necessary but not sufficient. If i believe, but keep murdering people and don't repent I don't get into heaven. If you believe you are expected to follow the rules as well (otherwise what does it mean to say you really believe). True belief leads to following the doctrines of they chosen religion to attain heaven. And it's not Christianity, in Islam belief is also necessary but not sufficient.

I'm not a rabbinical scholar (or theologian in any religion), but my understanding is that for the majority of sects of Judaism, the maximum time in Gehinnom is one full cycle of morning, or 12 months before reaching Gan Eden (the closest concept in Judiasm to heaven). So in Judism even behavior is not critical to the final outcome of afterlife.


Its funny that you keep saying you are taking about what Pascal's wager says while earlier mentioned that you had not actually read it. Maybe you've just read other people's versions that havetwisted it to support their agenda. Here again is the actual text of the wager (from The Project Gutenberg eBook of Pascal's Pensées, by Blaise Pascal.)

If you want to claim things about the wager please stick to what the actual wager says.. not Lewis' or someone else's interpretation. The issue that belief alone is sufficient is NOT in there.. its about betting to gain the an infinite afterlife. In what ever religion one considers there is either no infinite afterlife, or rules about what it takes to get there. If you accept the bet and bet GOD IS, then the rational peson will be expected to follow the rules to follow through on the wager.

 

Let us then examine this point, and say, "God is, or He is not." But to which side shall we incline? Reason can decide nothing here. There is an infinite chaos which separated us. A game is being played at the extremity of this infinite distance where heads or tails will turn up. What will you wager? According to reason, you can do neither the one thing nor the other; according to reason, you can defend neither of the propositions.

Do not then reprove for error those who have made a choice; for you know nothing about it. "No, but I blame them for having made, not this choice, but a choice; for again both he who chooses heads and he who chooses tails are equally at fault, they are both in the wrong. The true course is not to wager at all."

Yes; but you must wager. It is not optional. You are embarked. Which will you choose then? Let us see. Since you must choose, let us see which interests you least. You have two things to lose, the true and the good; and two things to stake,[Pg 67] your reason and your will, your knowledge and your happiness; and your nature has two things to shun, error and misery. Your reason is no more shocked in choosing one rather than the other, since you must of necessity choose. This is one point settled. But your happiness? Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation that He is.—"That is very fine. Yes, I must wager; but I may perhaps wager too much."—Let us see. Since there is an equal risk of gain and of loss, if you had only to gain two lives, instead of one, you might still wager. But if there were three lives to gain, you would have to play (since you are under the necessity of playing), and you would be imprudent, when you are forced to play, not to chance your life to gain three at a game where there is an equal risk of loss and gain. But there is an eternity of life and happiness. And this being so, if there were an infinity of chances, of which one only would be for you, you would still be right in wagering one to win two, and you would act stupidly, being obliged to play, by refusing to stake one life against three at a game in which out of an infinity of chances there is one for you, if there were an infinity of an infinitely happy life to gain. But there is here an infinity of an infinitely happy life to gain, a chance of gain against a finite number of chances of loss, and what you stake is finite. It is all divided; wherever the infinite is and there is not an infinity of chances of loss against that of gain, there is no time to hesitate, you must give all. And thus, when one is forced to play, he must renounce reason to preserve his life, rather than risk it for infinite gain, as likely to happen as the loss of nothingness.

For it is no use to say it is uncertain if we will gain, and it is certain that we risk, and that the infinite distance between the certainty of what is staked and the uncertainty of what will be gained, equals the finite good which is certainly staked against the uncertain infinite. It is not so, as every player stakes a certainty to gain an uncertainty, and yet he stakes a finite certainty to gain a finite uncertainty, without transgressing against reason. There is not an infinite distance between the certainty staked and the uncertainty of the gain; that is untrue. In truth, there is an infinity between the certainty of gain and the certainty of loss. But the uncertainty of the gain is proportioned to the certainty of the stake according to the[Pg 68] proportion of the chances of gain and loss. Hence it comes that, if there are as many risks on one side as on the other, the course is to play even; and then the certainty of the stake is equal to the uncertainty of the gain, so far is it from fact that there is an infinite distance between them. And so our proposition is of infinite force, when there is the finite to stake in a game where there are equal risks of gain and of loss, and the infinite to gain. This is demonstrable; and if men are capable of any truths, this is one.


The maroon highlighted portions of Pascal's dissertation are unwarranted assumptions, unsubstantiated assumptions, assumptions with no evidence: i.e., garbage. The only state ironclad logic can take you from such premises is sunk.

 

Perhaps you missed where I DID reformulate it.

The fact that you don't think a reformulation from Christian to Odin worship is valid, means that you don't think the wager is basically valid, you just like it because it reinforces your beliefs. Otherwise you would be trying to die in battle with EXACTLY the same fervor that you believe in your god.

 

I do not believe that Odin is a real god because in order to go to Valhalla I would have to be killed in battle... and I am a firm believer that god doesn't want the good warriors to die.

I think my surviving battles to live to old age is a much better choice and that is what the creator had in mind when I took my first breath this life...

As for the wager...

I'm betting there will be more controversy than consensus...

 

After 40+ pages, that's hardly a real bet!!!

 

There can only be one.

 

It's called "amm0bob's wager".

Tom

 

Like betting "BLACK" when playing Roulette...

 

LOL: only problem is safe bets don't give you the big payouts! Even though we'll never see eye to eye with politics, you're an OK guy JR

 

No, much closer to betting NOT "99". On the roulette wheel Not "99" is an exceptionally safe bet, but doesn't pay very much, about 1 cent for every $100,000 wagered, in the few houses that accept the bet in the first place, and they reserve the right to pay the penny winnings as vouchers only for their penny slot machines.

 

I don't agree the wager says that "if you believe you go to heaven" as it does not say that, but maybe people are presenting different models to you. I provided the text in my previous message.. do you read it as saying belief-> go to heaven.

Since I cannot know what what you consider to be commonly understood or what arguments others are providing you I cannot comment on those issues and will accept your belief that what they have said is rubbish and infantile since its is also very likely not what is actually in the wager.

 

You did not reformulate the wager nor did your formulation address how to choose which god. You just chose to bind GOD==odin, which i already agreed you have the right to do. The wager does not say which god.


I'll note you are presuming that I believe in a particular god. I never said I believe in the christian god. I already presented my ideas that try to address which religions beliefs make no sense to me.. and the ideas in many religions (including most christian sects) that there can be only one religion and all others are wrong just don't work for me. I also believe that any religion that requires me to kill others is also a power-play by leaders to manipulate them. Hence I would reject the requirements of Odin as a manipulative leadership, not the will of a just god.

 

It does to me, but Pascal was not a pithy writer and in all that thicket of hundreds of words he might well have meant ice creams are two for a dollar at Isaac's.

What do YOU think his wager is? In your words. And pardon me if you already stated that earlier (if so, just point us to the post and paragraph).

 

I posted my interpreation of the general form of the wager in
http://priuschat.com/forums/freds-house-pancakes/105328-pascals-wager-38.html#post1519758

Starting after the embedded quote. I'll write a shorter/cleaner summary tomorrow.

 

Not necessary - your summary is brief:

Conventional christianty's PRIMARY rule is belief. Anything else is cake icing; absent belief, admission to heaven is barred. So, YES, Pascal's Wager effectively says, "if you believe, you go to heaven".

You may add, on your own, that more than belief is required, but a whole shipload of whatever you add is dead in the water without belief to propel it.

 

Yes, it would. I was making a joke that Amm0's "bet" was a sure thing, not the nearly 50-50 of his quip about betting "black".

 

I guess our reading/training in Christianity are different. As I said (in some post), I see belief is necessary but not sufficient within Christianity (and Islam). Hence I see the wager as belief/commitment, not just belief.

So in your view of Christianity, if I Believe, then even if am a sociopath and serial killer that is still sufficient. Is it fine/rewarded if I continually disregard the teaching of the christ as long as I believe he existed?

One could get into what does belief mean, which, as you already pointed out, is at least partially below the conscious level. I can see why a religion will say it is fine if the a person strays from the path, as long as they were trying and are repentant when they fail. It can be fine if you were not on the path, start to believe and rejoin the path, but if you say you believe, if you even deeply believe, but rejection the rest of the teachings, I see it as you not believing in the actual christian ideals (or you would follow them), so thinking you believe is necessary but not sufficient.

On a broader view, I'll add that I consider the "believe or burn" aspects of multiple religions to be an artifacts of people who control the religious dogma. It is an effective model to keep/recruit people into that religion. It could be just a power-play by the religious leadership, and/or it could also be how an enlightened leadership found it easer to keep the average member properly focused on their religion. Its like the rules of Kosher, many of which were related to rules of healthy food preparation. Easier to consider them rules of god than to explain triginosis, bacterial-infestations and other things. Maybe god spoke to the early jews, or maybe early rabbi's figured it out on their own, but making it law makes it easier to keep people on a good path.


If you look at the text of the wager, its about betting on god and going all in. If the god on which you bet requires just belief as the minimum bet, then your bet is covered. If it requires deeds and not belief, different ante is need, if it requires beliefs and deeds, even greater ante. But compared to the infinite afterlife, no amount of finite ante makes it a bad bet. The wager does not tell one how to decide what is a minimally acceptable bet, nor what god to be on.

 

So exactly how did you know that the reformulation that I DIDN'T MAKE, didn't address how to choose which god?