Worshiping the God of the Catholic faith precludes me from worshiping any other, so I can only use Pascal’s Wager in that context. Playing “just in case” would violate my faith, so it’s an irrelevant question. It might be relevant for people of various other religions, though.That is not the assumption of Pascal’s Wager.
Oh, but that pretty much renders the wager futile.Worshiping the God of the Catholic faith precludes me from worshiping any other, so I can only use Pascal’s Wager in that context. Playing “just in case” would violate my faith, so it’s an irrelevant question. It might be relevant for people of various other religions, though.
This proves that the wager has no inherent value whatsoever until you imbue it with your own moral and societal values, which, by the way, are not universaly held.Likewise, a serial killer could miss out on adding more names to his death list. This proves nothing.
That would be in direct violation of the first commandment.
The “I don’t think” is the operational word here.I don’t think there’s anything to lose in being a Christian - certainly nothing of inherent or incontestable value
It requires that “God” is clearly defined, that’s all. I don’t see how that makes it futile; it simply means that the wager must be based on something substantial, not on a vague concept. After all, “God” could mean chocolate cake to the next person. It would be fairly useless if expressed in a relativistic context. The truth has to be accepted on its own terms, not on the terms of the individual. No argument is efficacious in all contexts.Oh, but that pretty much renders the wager futile. It has to be efficacious in any context, my friend.
Atheists dismiss it because it doesn’t address their concerns.Atheists dismiss it because it’s effective at pointing out their error.
| … | …God Exists… | …God does not exist |
|---|---|---|
| Believe… | …Reward… | …Nothing… |
| Disbelief… | …Punishment… | …Nothing… |
| … | …Strict God Exists… | …Forgiving God Exists… |
|---|---|---|
| Belief in Strict… | …Reward… | …Forgiveness (reward)… |
| Belief in Loving… | …Punishment… | …Reward… |
Uhh… Not the Christian God, so non-applicable. Also, no God realistically doesn’t want you to believe him and act on it. Your argument, while conceivable, is impossible with the Christian God and nothing but a naked assertion, a wild idea to reject something you don’t like, beyond that.Among the numerous problems of Pascal’s Wager, it can be reversed! Here’s one person’s reversal of Pascal’s Wager:
“Suppose there is a god, but he is only going to reward those who have enough courage not to believe in him. This god is no less likely than Pascal’s. By Believing in a god, Christians are risking eternal torture! When they die, they will be very surprised.”
I mean no offense when I type this, but I am hoping to provide the understanding of a perspective. There are those that feel part of the sentence that followed the above is equally applicable to Yahweh, Alluh, Zeus, and others…Also, no God realistically doesn’t want you to believe him and act on it.
In just limiting my consideration to the Abrahamic religions even if I consider Pascal’s Wager something that convinces me to go monotheistic it doesn’t provide any assistance in deciding which one of the religions or denominations. Check out Wikipedia’s list of Christian Denominations , branches of islam, or list of modern divisions of Judiasm.our argument, while conceivable, is impossible -]with the Christian God /-]and nothing but a naked assertion…
I could tell you to believe in Tinkerbell. If you believe in Tinkerbell, after you die, you will be transported to Neverland. If you don’t believe, you will simply cease to be. Obviously, it is much safer to believe in Tinkerbell.Uhh… Not the Christian God, so non-applicable. Also, no God realistically doesn’t want you to believe him and act on it. Your argument, while conceivable, is impossible with the Christian God and nothing but a naked assertion, a wild idea to reject something you don’t like, beyond that.
And that’s how I meant the sentence to be. I meant that ANY God ANYBODY could apply Pascal’s Wager to (although I think there are good defenses elsewhere for Christianity being the only major candidate) would not want somebody to have “courage” and not believe them over somebody having faith and believing on them. My point was, no matter which religion you apply it to, TruthSeeker’s argument fails.I mean no offense when I type this, but I am hoping to provide the understanding of a perspective. There are those that feel part of the sentence that followed the above is equally applicable to Yahweh, Alluh, Zeus, and others…
Well, that brings me around to a point. IMO, if you’re any Christian Denomination or Jewish one and you genuinely didn’t see the evidence for the “right” one, I think you will be rewarded regardless. That being said, if you’re actually interested in joining an Abrahamic faith because of PW, which I don’t think you are, but can’t find which denomination is right, I advice outside study to help.In just limiting my consideration to the Abrahamic religions even if I consider Pascal’s Wager something that convinces me to go monotheistic it doesn’t provide any assistance in deciding which one of the religions or denominations. Check out Wikipedia’s list of Christian Denominations , branches of islam, or list of modern divisions of Judiasm.
Being “convinced” by an argument is unimportant. What matters is the logical soundness of the argument. It doesn’t matter if you find PW “convincing” it matters if its logic holds up.I’m not convinced by Pascal’s Wager.
And what is that evidence, may I ask? I’m genuinely interested, so please do tell me.Having already encountered information that made belief in Yahweh something that I cannot sustain I doubt that I’ll encounter something that will re-convince me to believe that a deity name Yahweh exists any more than I expect to encounter something that will re-convince me that an arctic dwelling immortal magical man named Santa Claus exists.
Ceasing to be is neutral, while hell is negative, ergo, a strawman.I could tell you to believe in Tinkerbell. If you believe in Tinkerbell, after you die, you will be transported to Neverland. If you don’t believe, you will simply cease to be. Obviously, it is much safer to believe in Tinkerbell.
If your argument was not a strawman, you would address the concern of the possibility of me dying and suffering for eternity.Problem is… why should you believe? Did I address any concerns you have?
Well, you can study for evidence for your faith after. I’m not saying blind faith is good or healthy, but it’s a better starting point than atheism for a study of the evidence (or lack thereof)No- The problem here is that the wager doesn’t give reasons why to believe, other than reward/punishment. It isn’t concerned with evidence, merely risk. It also assigns the same probabilities to each square on the board.
Well, as I pointed out above, if you’re genuinely convinced by PW but can’t decide which God there’s nothing about the wager which rules out outside study. I suppose you could start at classical theism and choose a specific religion after you find one which the evidence supports (to you, at least).Suppose there is a [name of deity]. He will reward you for [action] after death. If you do not do [same action], then you are risking punishment!
As you failed to address, TS’s argument is just a rationalization for being too lazy to follow Pascal’s Wager - even if he disguises it as nothing but one “of many logical problems in the argument” (paraphrase). No God would realistically behave that way - there’s certainly no God I’ve seen in the Religion Books I’ve read. And also, at this point in time, it is FAR more courageous to believe than to be an atheist.“Suppose there is a god, but he is only going to reward those who have enough courage not to believe in him. This god is no less likely than Pascal’s. By Believing in a god, Christians are risking eternal torture! When they die, they will be very surprised.”
Pascal already addressed this “problem”, actually. What Hitchens ignores is the *psychology *behind the Wager - you won’t get saved for fake faith, at least not in the form of it as saving faith, although maybe you will go to purgatory, but if you go with the whole scheme, go to mass, confession, pray nightly, Pascal argued that fake belief would become real belief. In fact, modern psychology supports this conclusion very much so.To me, the Hitchens objection to Pascal’s Wager stills works. Since belief must be authentic by definition, to treat Pascal’s Wager seriously is, in effect, to say that God either isn’t capable to telling the difference between faked belief and the real thing, or is perfectly capable but doesn’t care. My only question, why would any believer subscribe to such a being.
I don’t want to take this thread too far off subject. So I will keep my answer restricted to a few pieces of information. I had known of some of this information before my de-conversion from Christianity began. It didn’t play any significant role in my de-conversion, but together with other information it does form part of the body of information that I think makes it unlikely that I will ever become a Christian again.And what is that evidence, may I ask? I’m genuinely interested, so please do tell me.
I’m sorry; you’re right. A more apt punishment would be living inside a giant crocodile for eternity. Tick Tock.Ceasing to be is neutral, while hell is negative, ergo, a strawman.
I’m not certain I accept this. Do you first make up your mind about something new and then look for the evidence to study?Well, you can study for evidence for your faith after. I’m not saying blind faith is good or healthy, but it’s a better starting point than atheism for a study of the evidence (or lack thereof)
I do agree with you that such a god would be crazy. I don’t think this particular suggestion is any more crazy than my Tinkerbell one though. It follows a formula. It is asking you to believe in something (possibly) incredulous with no evidence; arguing that Blind Faith and Adherence is a virtue in such a situation.As you failed to address, TS’s argument is just a rationalization for being too lazy to follow Pascal’s Wager - even if he disguises it as nothing but one “of many logical problems in the argument” (paraphrase). No God would realistically behave that way - there’s certainly no God I’ve seen in the Religion Books I’ve read. And also, at this point in time, it is FAR more courageous to believe than to be an atheist.
Pascal already addressed this “problem”, actually. What Hitchens ignores is the psychology behind the Wager - you won’t get saved for fake faith, at least not in the form of it as saving faith, although maybe you will go to purgatory, but if you go with the whole scheme, go to mass, confession, pray nightly, Pascal argued that fake belief would become real belief. In fact, modern psychology supports this conclusion very much so.
I’ve seen that stuff before. I don’t know how far your study extended, but serious scholars no longer consider the possibility of the major events of Genesis and Exodus being ripped off from Pagan cultures. Even Wikipedia, which has a liberal bias, admits that Exodus probably did not use any Mesopotamian documents as sources. Other than that I advise these links:There is information that shows that parts of Christianity came from other religions and have been blended into Christianity. There is the Enuma Elish from an ancient Babylonian religion; a creation story found in stone documents whose origins predates the earliest known forms of Christianity. There is Gilgamesh, an ancient story that among other things includes a snake that robbed a man of everlasting life by preventing him from eating a fruit (as opposed to manipulating him into eating it) and a story of a man that saved life on earth from being destroyed by a flood that one of the gods had sent to destroy the world.
While you are accurate, you seem not to have read into this beyond that, and had a fundamentalist understanding of the issue. YES, the first century Christians had a much different (and probably correct) interpretation of terms and doctrines than modern Christians, NO that doesn’t pose a problem to Christianity. If anything, it SUPPORTS us.The great fluidity that is applied to the meaning of words and phrases in the bible brings into question what interpretation is “correct.” I don’t think I need to detail this area too much. The impacts of differences in interpretation of words interferes with communication within these forums. Find one of the threads on “free will” for an example. The manner in which some key words in Christianity (“salvation”, “believe”, “redemption”, so on) were used in other documents from around the same time as the documents that form the bible show that our interpretation of them today is different than they were when they were written.
Actually, many early Christians opted for an allegorical interpretation themselves. The point is, it being allegory doesn’t really do us any harm.What was the interpretation of the statement about the earth resting on pillars and being unmovable? The statement was once taken to be literal. From knowledge of celestial mechanics, our solar system, and the shape of the earth this interpretation is almost dead.Many interpretations today now say it is a metaphor. Though there is still opposition to scientific findings today because those findings don’t agree with an interpretation of something from the bible.
While there were changes to the books, those don’t create any problems to non-fundamentalists. Core doctrines still remain and anything which seems really problematic is probably decontextualized. I noticed you mentioned Bart Ehrman as one of your sources. The review below may be of some help:Information on the construction of the bible also shows the the documents that were pulled together to construct it had their own evolution. Comparison of older versions of the documents which we now call “books of the bible” there can be found insertions, deletions, and modifications. Analysis of vocabulary and dialect used within the documents also points to some one having made changes when duplicating the documents. Some of the modifications are thought to be unintentional mistakes that one might expect from the documents being hand copied. For some modifications there are political goals that may have motivated slight modifications. Some of the information that appears to have been added to these documents includes the stories that had been borrowed and blended from other religions. These modifications also suggest an answer to the question of why accounts for some events in different books in the bible are not consistent.
They already made 3 of them, if not more, one for Pauline NT and another for OT. The OT is untested, but the 2 Pauline NT ones have both been run. One agrees with the scholarly consensus but the latter, after being given more up-to-date manuscripts, stated that all but one of the Paulines are by one author. The point is, software like this is nothing special - there are already people who can do it, and it’s easy to program “invisible bias” into the machine, or not even program it but hide data. That being said, if you think you can actually make a form of the software which reads ancient language, analyzes it based on ancient style and rhetoric, takes scribes into account, and lacks bias, I advice sending it to a scholar somewhere.The interesting thing to me about this information is it may be something that I can test myself with software. I’m already working on something that will be used to identify a person by their writing style given a sample of writings (e-mails, instant messages, so on) from a collection of people. With some modification I may be able to use this examine these documents in the same manner to see if I get similar results. Though I’ve not yet found how I can get digital copies of the different versions of these documents.
Ouch, harsh.That being said, if you think you can actually make a form of the software which reads ancient language, analyzes it based on ancient style and rhetoric, takes scribes into account, and lacks bias, I advice sending it to a scholar somewhere.
This is not a new claim at all.There is information that shows that parts of Christianity came from other religions and have been blended into Christianity. There is the Enuma Elish from an ancient Babylonian religion; a creation story found in stone documents whose origins predates the earliest known forms of Christianity. There is Gilgamesh, an ancient story that among other things includes a snake that robbed a man of everlasting life by preventing him from eating a fruit (as opposed to manipulating him into eating it) and a story of a man that saved life on earth from being destroyed by a flood that one of the gods had sent to destroy the world.
Thanks for the information. I’ve not gone through it yet but I’ve booked marked it and have it on my queue of reading material.I Other than that I advise these links:
christianthinktank.com/gilgymess.html
tektonics.org/af/babgenesis.html
… I noticed you mentioned Bart Ehrman as one of your sources. The review below may be of some help:
tektonics.org/books/ehrqurvw.html
“Bias” has special meaning when talking about artificial inteligence agents, so I’m qualifying to any one aware of the other meaning that I’m using “bias” as it would be used in conversation.The point is, software like this is nothing special - there are already people who can do it, and it’s easy to program “invisible bias” into the machine, or not even program it but hide data. That being said, if you think you can actually make a form of the software which reads ancient language, analyzes it based on ancient style and rhetoric, takes scribes into account, and lacks bias, I advice sending it to a scholar somewhere.