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Pascal's Wager fails for at least a couple good reasons:
1. Using his own reasoning, it is also possible that a god exists who would be even more upset with us for worshiping the Christian god than he would be for us being atheists. Since there is some chance of this, and this is a high-stakes scenario, we should therefore remain atheists. As you can see, his wager can apply equally to any imaginary situation.
Indeed, Pascal's Wager presumes that we know nothing about any deities and are merely hedging our bets. But all deity outlooks are thereby possible. One of these possibilities is a deity who is entirely unconcerned with disbelief, but is driven to rage by anyone who believes in a deity other than itself. In that case, atheists are perfectly safe, but believers are gambling that they've just happened to pick correctly from the thousands of deities out there.
There's also the fact that the wager treats belief as something that can be turned on and off as needed, but obviously this is not the case. Mark Zuckerberg could offer me a billion dollars to believe in leprechauns, but I could not do so. I could claim I believed in leprechauns, but it would be a lie, and any omnipotent deity would see through a calculated false claim, no?
Your average 7th-grader could see through the gaping logical holes in Pascal's Wager.
Using his own reasoning, it is also possible that a god exists who would be even more upset with us for worshiping the Christian god than he would be for us being atheists.
Yes.
I grew up in fundamentalist Christianity and independently "discovered" Pascal's wager on my own sometime around age 10. At age 10 I was already wondering how I knew any of what I had been taught was actually true. I figured that I should believe "just in case" it were true. Better safe than sorry, I thought.
Then I went to college and learned about Islam. I quickly realized that, if Islam were actually the One True Religion, Allah would be pretty angry with me for worshipping the false god of Christianity. After that, Pascal's Wager never seemed like a good reason to believe in Christianity.
You were a smart kid Like I say, when Christianity fondly wishes that all become as little children, they are overlooking that kids can be pretty hard o fool. What they really mean is that people should all check their undoubted smart minds at the church door.
I watched a you tube of a panel of theists and atheists trying to be polite to each other, and theists saying that the thing that annoyed them most was the accusation of 'checking your mind at the church door'. But that is what they want and often get. It's not just switching off the mind though. We see here some pretty smart cookies going in to bat for the Bible. What they actually do is bias the critical faculties to the service of Faith.
That's why a clever man like Pascal came up with an argument that could be blown out of the water by a 10 year old. He simply switched off the critical faculties that would have old him what was wrong with it. He knew about Islam -even in the 17th c.
Despite how easily the wager is discredited, it seems to have a long shelf life among believers. I suppose it is one of those things you lean on when you don't have a substantial foundation for your belief.
I view in the same manner as a number of famous sayings which have been around and get treated as global wisdom, but don't actually mean very much. Over on the history board, at least once a month you will find someone who thinks he or she is making a wonderful contribution by recycling George Santayana's "Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it."
Break it down and it makes no sense. History is chockablock with examples of people who learned from history and repeated it anyway. France's construction of the Maginot line was a reaction to the supremacy of the defense in WW I. France remembered and prepared so as to avoid repeating their mistakes. Of course mechanized armor and air power made WW II into one where mobility was supreme and static defenses obsolete.
And why should someone who fails to learn a lesson from history be any more likely to repeat a mistake he or she didn't understand, as opposed to simply making a brand new mistake? Santayana was pithy, but not especially logical.
Pascal's wager belong in the same refuge bin as "What goes around, comes around", but this fails to stop people from pulling it out, dusting it off and presenting it with a sense of satisfaction one associates with winning a ping-pong match.
It's really down to sloppy, irrational but quite self -righteous convictions.
These Ploys come almost instinctively -the same old debunked arguments = "nature is so wonderful - must be God" "Millions would not die for a lie" and "Of course the Bible's true - why else would it be read in so many languages'
While I have heard despairing groans ("not that old argument again!") when mentioning the dinosaurs as reasons to question Creationism (1), attempts to claim that sheer conviction proves something (yes, a closed, biased and self -righteous mindset), and the bemusing but fascinating change of trying to argue seriously to cheap point -scoring with 'teasing the atheists for Jesus', show how winning the argument (remarkable how "Getting the Last word" is so important) is considered more important than getting at the truth - even if you have to change your mind. Dammit- willingness to reconsider is portrayed as weakness in the argument, while refusal to reconsider even in the face of undeniable proof (*koff* Temple mount *koff*) is regarded under "Courage of convictions" as making for a strong case.
"Stand up for your right to be wishy -washy".(Charlie Brown)
I learned as a schoolkid that "Arguments from asshat sayings" was flawed, because of two proverbs:
"Fine feathers make fine birds" and
"Fine feathers do not a fine bird make".
"Many hands make light work"
"Too many cooks spoil the broth".
Now there are explanations and it's good old equivocation (2) but the point is that these can b trotted out at need to back up a prejudice - either imposing a bunch of interfering fools, or refusing to provide any assistance when needed. But the point is -rather than having to argue the case, the asshat saying is trotted out as though it proved it.
And so goes the endless list of sloppy thinking, bias, cheating, self justification and fingers in the ears that is the sad standard of human thinking, and I could almost stand it if it was done knowingly by the elite to breed idiots that can be easily duped, but the sadness is that the people who are elected to decide what is and is not taught, think just the same way and see nothing wrong with it.
(1) that was before they could not sideline the evidence and theological logic any longer the dinosaurs had to be on the Ark, too. But dismissing "Old" arguments, even though still valid is cheating. (qv. 'Lawyer tricks").
(2) with that tip, I'm sure you can work it out, but I'll explain, if you want.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 05-31-2017 at 09:54 AM..
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