Wads4

"One creator God states that there is one natural order in the universe and everything reflects that one order. In Greek mythology, Zeus would control the weather, Poseidon would control the seas, and Apollo the Sun. Therefore they would the Sun would have no impact on the weather, and the moon would have no impact on the tides. One creator makes everything in the universe interconnected. We are able to learn about the universe through making base assumptions and then using those assumptions to come up with new assumptions. If there wasn't one order, then we are wasting our time because we would never understand every diffrent system in place."

Even religion has managed to evolve over the last three thousand years since the polytheistic Greek gods, and now realises that the Universe is "One" and everything is interconnected. As cosmic and biochemical and biological Evolution also reaches this conclusion, but by way of logical steps, empirically verified, you now no longer need the primitive monotheism of the Israelites; Logical necessity replaces a creator God: if there is no necessary logic prior to God then you may as well continue to believe there is a God constantly regulating every tiny stage of your metabolism,--in which case the existence of this chemical-regulatory God should be overwhelmingly obvious--but it isn't. Or perhaps he goes by other names now, like "Enzyme" or "hormone". Ever tried praying to a hormone?

Alf

The problem is that this uncertainty - which god to choose - undermines the supposed benifit of believing.

Essentially pascal argues that believing is so great because at worst nothing happens and at best you can get to heaven while if you do not believe at best nothing happens while at worst you end up in hell.

However, the fact that if you then choose to believe in the wrong god can cause you to end up in hell even if you believe completely undermines that argument and makes it worthless. There simply is no reason to believe in god if you most likely end up believing in the wrong god and end up in hell anyway.

Also, it presumes a particular type of god. What if god was different? What if God was fair and said "Ok, the atheist may also end up in heaven if he lived a decent life".

Again, the wager's argument is worthless.

Alf

Wads4

We are not interested in made-up stories about a fictional God who you have to invent in order to provide a pseudo-explanation for problems which you cannot answer either. Science does answer questions, and will answer more as time goes on. Why not put your God-of the gaps argument on hold at least until the Large Hadron Collider starts up at CERN next year- you never know, it might find the "God particle", and science will have answered all your queries,--unlike your God. Pascal's Wager is a phoney argument not worthy of its mathematical founder. it is easy to invert against believers:

1. God will send all Christians to Hell because they discarded the analytical thinking brain which he gave them, and instead chose blind uncritical faith, so as hypocritically to try and flatter God into letting them in to heaven. Do you really think he won't see through that ?--whereas we atheists will be praised for trying to discern the truth through science and philosophy,-even if we failed.

2. Are you not worried about all the great Gods of antiquity whom you have insulted, and their temples that your predecessors destroyed and vandalised?
They will be waiting for you in the Judgement Hall of the Gods of Egypt, where you will be led into the presence of Osiris, judge of the dead,-your soul will be weighed in the balance, by Anubis, and be found wanting,-and your wicked deeds recorded for posterity by Thoth,--whereupon your soul will be devoured by the crocodile God, Sebek. It is no use saying you don't believe it,-that is no excuse-as a wicked atheist, an unbeliever in the true religion which existed long before the puny God of Israel, who can't even demonstrate his own existence,-you will really be for it; so why not believe, just in case? Are you really so certain there are no Gods?You are shifting the burden of proof onto atheists. You said God exists--you prove it.

rhutchin

Your position is that one should believe in science and have faith that science will answer all the unanswered questions that people have. That’s one option to choose and expresses your faith.

However, unless you can prove with certainty that there is no God and no judgment for your behavior and no eternal torment, belief in science will not help you escape eternal torment. You are making an irrational decision. Of course, no one said that you are had to be rational.

Nice point but what does it have to do with anything. One is subject to eternal torment because he sins. It is nice that you seek truth through science and philosophy, but how could science and philosophy enable a person to escape eternal torment? They can’t. The only truth that can help a person escape eternal torment is that truth he finds in the Bible. It is that truth that points a person to Christ to escape eternal torment.

There are many alleged gods out there and more are invented every day. No more than one god can be the true and living God. Maybe someone can investigate all these gods to determine how many threaten eternal torment and the method they provide for people to escape torment. One can then evaluate these gods to see which could be the true God. Does one really have to worry about Osiris?

No one has to prove that God exists. It is only the proof that God does not exist that matters. If I refuse to prove that God exists, you still face the problem that your decision to put your faith in science could be a wrong decision resulting in you losing everything. If you are able to prove that God does not exist, then you have nothing to worry about.

rhutchin

You have described an issue not addressed by the Wager. The Wager leads to the conclusion that a rational person would seek to ecape eternal torment and would believe in God to do this. Pascal did believe that the God whom one must believe is the Biblical god. However, there are a lot of gods out there that people claim threaten eternal torment. This just means that each person has some work to do to escape eternal torment. The Wager was never meant to do this for the person. The Wager simply shows you that nonbelief is an irrational action to take.

steamer

I can't see where you addressed how non-belief in the Easter bunny and Easter bunny hell isn't the same proposition as this one. After all, you don't know with certainty that the Easter bunny isn't real.

The wager is the same. The Easter bunny will send you to Easter bunny hell if you do not believe in him.

It's very simple to believe that the Easter bunny is real, it's simply a matter of choosing this belief. It's equally simple to believe in Easter bunny hell, as there is equal evidence to believe in a Christian hell.

Are you really trying to say that nonbelief in the Easter Bunny is an irrational action to take and that it's possible for you to delude yourself into believing in his existence merely by choosing to do so?

Mageth

Translation:

The Wager is an emotional argument that tries to scare you into belief in a particular Christian God (one that will burn you for eternity in Hell if you don't believe in it).

DMC

Pascal's Wager amounts to nothing more than the Gambler's Fallacy.

I see it like this:

I have the choice to buy a lottery ticket from a stranger.

Pascal's wager would state that I have a better chance of winning the lottery if I buy the ticket than if I do not buy the ticket. Pascal assumes "nothing to lose".

Pascal assumes there is a lottery. Even if there is not, the chances are better that I will win if I buy the ticket. but even then that assumes there is no punishment for buying the ticket. There very well could be a punishment for buying a forged ticket. In that case, I would be worse off to buy the ticket than had I not bought any ticket. Pascal assumes there is a God and that any specific religion is better than none. Pascal overlooks the equal possibility that this "god" might go harder on one who chooses based on odds than one who follows his intellectual honesty system.

Basically Pascal does not factor in the other possibilities, but assumes the deck is has a finite set of possibilites, one of which would be the desired outcome and none of which would be worse than not choosing.


Regardless, belief is not a choice. It's brought about through compelling evidence. I could no sooner choose to believe in a god than I could choose to believe Tom Green deserves an Oscar.

Amaleq13

This is clearly an effort to shift the burden from where it rationally belongs (ie supporting the affirmative claim) to the inherently logically problematic effort of "proving a negative".

The burden is upon you or anyone else who claims that God exists.

If an individual is not convinced that the evidence sufficiently supports the existence of God, the individual is entirely, rationally justified in refusing to accept the claim regardless of any threats involved in the alleged existence of the entity.

Amaleq13

Could you really choose to genuinely believe in the existence of the Easter bunny?

I know I couldn't.