Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[WanderingGaze22]

Imagine an atheist comes across a priest who tells them they shouldn't be. The priest's argument is as follows: "If you are a believer in God, and God exists, you will go to heaven. If you do not believe, you risk the possibly going to the Inferno. Your earthly life is rather short. At the most, you will live a century. However, the afterlife is long, an eternity in fact. Therefore, you might as well invest your short earthly life as a believer, because if there is no God, you don't lose much time, but if there is a God, you gain an eternity in Heaven." Is the priest's gamble worth it? Does is seem convincing to consider becoming a believer? Below is a link to a book that debates God's existence. Use as a reference to delve into this though experiment.

https://gccaz.summon.serialssolutions.c ... g_u9470912

[Pattern-chaser]

Pascal's Wager fails if God differentiates between (true) belief, and 'belief' feigned for selfish purposes.

The more authoritarian Western Abrahamic faiths would certainly require and demand true belief. On God's behalf, of course....

[JackDaydream]

@Wandering Gaze

The problem which I have always seen with Pascal's wager is that it seems to involve fear. It seems to involve lack of certainty about God, with a view to it being better to choose the option of belief in God, just in case this is necessary for consequences in any possible afterlife.

[chewybrian]

Pascal's wager seems to present a false dichotomy, as if God could only exist in the exact way that I understand Him to exist. It's possible that if there is a God, He doesn't care what opinion, if any, that I hold about Him, or He might be angry at me for thinking about Him. He might judge me on entirely different grounds than whether I have faith or not, and might even be terribly unfair about His reasons for saving some and not others.

"What if we pick the wrong religion? Every week we're just making God madder and madder!", Homer Simpson

[Gee]

Pascal's wager seems to present a false dichotomy, as if God could only exist in the exact way that I understand Him to exist. It's possible that if there is a God, He doesn't care what opinion, if any, that I hold about Him, or He might be angry at me for thinking about Him. He might judge me on entirely different grounds than whether I have faith or not, and might even be terribly unfair about His reasons for saving some and not others.

"What if we pick the wrong religion? Every week we're just making God madder and madder!", Homer Simpson

I love the quote by Homer Simpson. Never heard that before.

Gee

[LuckyR]

Imagine an atheist comes across a priest who tells them they shouldn't be. The priest's argument is as follows: "If you are a believer in God, and God exists, you will go to heaven. If you do not believe, you risk the possibly going to the Inferno. Your earthly life is rather short. At the most, you will live a century. However, the afterlife is long, an eternity in fact. Therefore, you might as well invest your short earthly life as a believer, because if there is no God, you don't lose much time, but if there is a God, you gain an eternity in Heaven." Is the priest's gamble worth it? Does is seem convincing to consider becoming a believer? Below is a link to a book that debates God's existence. Use as a reference to delve into this though experiment.

https://gccaz.summon.serialssolutions.c ... g_u9470912

Pascal's wager is completely logical... except not for gods. Maybe for kings or a totalitarian state or some other human decision makers, but any god fooled by the wager doesn't deserve to be called a god.