Pascal's Wager - Any Way to Live a Life

jaywill writes:

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I am a Christian and I guess the closest I have come to something like Pascal's Wager is to assure people that I will have no regrets whatsoever if I find out that I was duped about Jesus.

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Then why won't you extend that courtesy to atheists? You do realize that Pascal's Wager threatens eternal damnation and hellfire, yes?

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I honestly believe that believing in Christ was the best possible life I could have lived. If I had 100 lives to live, I can't see me wasting one on a Christless existence.

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Why can't you extend that concept to others? If you can handle it with regard to your life, what makes you think others don't feel the same way about their lives?That's one of the many fallacies of the wager.

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Rrhain

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Thank you for your submission to Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.

jaywill responds to me:

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I allow you every curtesy to say how you would spend your one life or your hypothetical 100. As for me, I said, after experiencing belief in Christ I would not waste one on a life devoid of Jesus.

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But in the context of the wager, which you mentioned, this doesn't work. The only reason to bring it up is to convince someone else of the error of their ways.

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Where is the lack of curtesy?

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Spelling flame (yeah, I know): Courtesy. With an "o." "Curtesy" is just a couple more typos from "curtsey," which is a type of obeisance, and "cutesy," a describer of something coy and silly.But the lack of courtesy is the wager, itself. It exists for one reason: To convince someone else that he's wrong. If you think you're life is fine, then that's great. Nobody really asked you, but good for you.

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I don't know if your particular exposure to Pascal's Wager like arguments involves hell fire.

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(*blink!*)You did not just say that, did you? While the proposition that Pascal put directly forward doesn't mention damnation, it also only covers a few of the options:If god exists and you believe, you win everything.
If god doesn't exist and you believe, then you haven't lost anything.
If god doesn't exist and you don't believe, then you haven't lost anything.Hmmm...what if god exists and you don't believe? Well, Pascal is putting forth the wager specifically to encourage Catholicism. What do you think he would be saying? In the rest of Pensées, he makes points of saying that he isn't talking about belief in god in general but rather Christianity, Catholicism in specific. To pretend that Pascal wasn't aware of this and that it doesn't color the interpretation of the wager is to play dumb.Please don't play dumb.

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Rrhain

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Thank you for your submission to Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.