Comments on: Pascal’s Wager inverted: all atheists go to heaven?

By: derek

derek — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 09:51:44 +0000

pascals wager is fine, but you could apply it to all gods, ra, thor, allah, odin, the list goes on, so which god should you believe in

By: Carlo Paggi

Carlo Paggi — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 10:52:02 +0000

Hello,

why use the name Pascal when, as Jon pointed out,
it is *not* Pascal’s wager we are talking about.

Let’s call it – say – Mr. Banana wager, just to clarify matter.

Cheers,
C

By: Paul

Paul — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:36:49 +0000

It is very interesting indeed. I would go a bit further though, because there are more flaws in Pascal’s game theoretic model (of course, it is a bit pretentious to give this label to this theory). Another critique would be that it does not take into account the fact that the preference rankings of different individuals may skew his results. Moreover, the payoffs can only be finite due to the law of diminishing returns. There certainly is a point where the cost function meets the benefit function in this situation, thus rendering Pascal’s theory rather artificial.

By: Paul

Paul — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 10:40:02 +0000

It’s obvious that only atheists go to heaven. God is quite able to make himself non-existant. As a result of this only people whom don’t believe in God are actually speaking the truth ; all those who do believe in God are limiting God’s power. This is just to show how Pascal’s wager turned on it’s head might be thought of in practice. Also you might try backing up your argument with a quote from the bible ‘In the last days there will be many christians whom when I asked them what they did say we preached your word and did miracles in your name. Evildoers.’

By: Gary

Gary — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 16:13:54 +0000

This entire discussion exemplifies the fundamental issue with “beliefs”. Anyone can believe anything – regardless of it being rational or irrational. Is there a God? Who knows? Is there no God? Who knows? Many gods? Same answer. One thing can be said with certainty – game theory exists and is applicable to a wide array of real-world problems. And while God or gods may or may not exist, it seems many of the real-world problems have been caused at the very least in their Name or names.

If you have any interest in understanding how the Christian church has over time come to view scientific thinking I would suggest the course “Science and Religion” from the Teaching Company.

If you are interested, it is here: http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/CourseDescLong2.aspx?cid=4691

BTW – I have no relationship with this organization, I simply have found their materials useful and insightful.

As it happens, much of traditional theological thought and scientific thought are actually aligned. It has only been in relatively recent times there has occurred such a divisive perspective between the two.

Thanks for an interesting article and perspective.