Reflectorites
On Sun, 03 Dec 2000 17:15:34 -0600, Chris Cogan wrote:
SJ>Pascal's point was that we *are* all wagering that we are right, against
>*all* other religions and philosophies, whether we realise it or not:
>
>"Yes, but you must wager. There is no choice, you are already
>committed. Which will you choose then? ... You would have to
>play (since you must necessarily play) ..." (Pascal B., "Pensees,"
>Penguin, 1966, p.123)
>CC>If one is already committed, then there is no room for choice. The
>choice, if any, has already been made. Thus, saying ,"Which will you
>choose then?" becomes rather silly, because it assumes that one is *not*
>committed. Pascal should make up his mind.
Chris misunderstands Pascal. He is not saying that one has no choice
at all. What he is saying is that one has no choice not to *wager*.
That is because if even if one does nothing one has in effect wagered
that Christianity is false, because no one is born a Christian. That is
what Pascal means by "you are already committed".
CC>Further, though it's true that in a very narrow sense we may all be said
>to be "betting" that we are right, this is really only meaningful if "live"
>alternatives are in fact available. Christianity is too full of nonsense to be a
>meaningful alternative to many of us. In such a case. Besides, a God who
>would have us try to brainwash ourselves into believing in him would be
>too stupid to blow his own nose without help.
So Chris has made his wager based on his estimate that "Christianity is too
full of nonsense to be a meaningful alternative." So In effect, Chris has
estimated the probability of Christianity being true is 0.
I have wagered the opposite to Chris. My estimate of Christianity being
true is a probability of somewhere between 0.99 and 1 (the latter being
absolute certainty). I am not exaggerating - based on the *evidence*
that I know, I find it hard to imagine how Christianity could be false.
I would now remind Chris of the consequences of our respective wagers.
If he is right and Christianity is false, then he and I will both die and never
wake up. Then neither he nor I would have lost anything. Chris is presumably
happy with his life as an atheist and I am very happy with my life as a
Christian.
But if Chris is wrong, and Christianity is true, then both Chris and I will die
and wake up. But then for Chris, there will be everlasting self-inflicted
torment as he contemplates *eternity* with what might have been. OTOH
for me there will be everlasting happiness.
In this classic version of Pascal's wager between an atheist and a Christian,
I can't lose anything, but I can gain everything. Chris OTOH cannot gain
anything, but he can lose everything.
CC>Thus, in another sense, no wager at all is involved, or, indeed, even
>possible. We believe what we believe, for whatever reasons we believe it,
>whether they are good or bad. We cannot *believe* on the basis of a
>betting situation. If I thought there was a significant chance that the
>Christian God existed, and that the rewards of *betting* on him were
>sufficient, etc., and *if* there was some way to bet on him, I might do so.
>But that would not change the cognitive basis of my belief, and it would
>not enable me to *believe* in him. The best I could do would be to try to
>hypnotize myself into believing in him, or something of that sort. But, until
>I succeeded, I would not be believing in him. I might be either
>*pretending* to believe in him or simply worrying that he might exist and I
>might lose out because I was not lucky enough to be *stupid* enough to
>fail to see the flaws in the arguments for his existence, etc., but I would not
>be actually believing in him until the hypnosis or brainwashing actually took
>sufficient effect.
No. There are plenty of atheists who become Christians - I myself did. All
one needs to do is admit that one could be wrong and look again at the
evidence *without prejudice* to satisfy oneself whether Christianity is
true or false.
Chris cannot afford a false negative, i.e. deciding that Christianity is false
when it really is true, because the consequences are so ruinous. So Chris
must satisfy himself that there is no reasonable possibility that Christianity
could be true.
And by Christianity, I mean *real* Christianity, not some strawman of Chris'
own imagining because that would have accomplished nothing and
Chris would know in his heart that he was fooling himself.
Chris must satisfy himself, in his *heart*. The test would be that Chris
would be then relaxed about Christianity, and not getting angry at Christians
or their God anymore. We do not get angry at some South Sea
Islanders' god, or its followers, because we believes in our hearts that
there is no real possibility of that god being true.
I was reading the Koran the other day and it threatens me with eternal
punishment unless I become a Moslem. But I don't bother attacking
Moslems because I believe in my heart that there is *no* chance that
Islam is true and so Mohammed's God is no more a threat to me than
the Tooth Fairy.
That Chris gets angry at the Christian God and Christians tells me that
despite all his philosophising, Chris still believes in his heart that the
Christian God is real enough to be a threat. If He is real enough to
Chris to be a threat to him, then to Chris His probability cannot be 0.
CC>But, then, what kind of slimy, malignant, deranged, mindless God
>would ever make such demands of people, anyway? Such a God is not
>even logically possible, so how could I even be slightly concerned that such
>a God might exist and that I'd be losing out for *failing* to brainwash
>myself into believing in him?
See above. Methinks Chris doth protest too much! If the Christian "God is
not even logically possible" then why does Chris even *bother* to be angry
at Him? Presumably Chris doesn't get angry at the Tooth Fairy?
Steve
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"From 1953 onward, Willy Fowler and I have always been intrigued by the
remarkable relation of the 7.65 Mev energy level in the nucleus of 12 C to
the 7.12 Mev level in 16 O. If you wanted to produce carbon and oxygen in
roughly equal quantities by stellar nucleosynthesis, these are the two levels
you would have to fix, and your fixing would have to be just where these
levels are actually found to be. Another put-up job? Following the above
argument, I am inclined to think so. A common sense interpretation of the
facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as
with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth
speaking about in nature." (Hoyle F., "The Universe: Past and Present
Reflections," Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Vol. 20,
1982, pp.1-35, p.16)
Stephen E. Jones | Ph. +61 8 9448 7439 | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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