Pascals Wager

Originally posted by apathist
If there is one god, there are lots of them. I know monotheism was supposed to be some sort of advanced thinking. It's not.

Not quite right I fear. Polytheism allows for a hierarchy of gods and may assign special importance to one, such as the Sun god which in Egypt was briefly virtually a monotheistic God. Lesser gods can be very limited in their powers and roles. When Alexander the Great declared he was a god and when the Greeks accepted this claim, there was no ludicrous suggestion that he could be assigned the kind of attributes claimed for the God of the monotheists.

Monotheism allowed for only one God, albeit the Christian account of a Trinity stretched this concept in ways that are not rationally explained. (That's okay though as the Trinity is "A Mystery" and as such transcends reason, don't you know). However, the monotheist religions all allow for a plethora of other spiritual beings, ranging from the hosts of angels and fallen angels, through to the saints who of course are deceased humans. These spiritual beings are not termed "gods" but in most respects they have the attributes of what polytheists would have called gods. Of course, we no longer get, say, a god of the wind or the sea, but that's fine as we substitute a patron saint of the wind or the sea, etc ad nauseam.

Polytheists were more readily converted to Christianity once they realised they could keep all their superstitions under slightly varied names. Thus they avoid worshipping other gods than their one jealous God, but instead can pray to their other spiritual beings and make sacrifices under the guise of "offerings" and so forth. The changes are cosmetic. They keep the authorities out of the way. Hence, we find in Ireland that many of the superstitions of the old Celtic traditions have been repackaged into acceptable form and persist to the present day. Indeed there are times when it is tempting to believe that the Christianity actually practised by most people in Ireland (for example) is a superficial cloak for what are actually pagan beliefs.

Originally posted by finnegan
Not quite right I fear. Polytheism allows for a hierarchy of gods and may assign special importance to one, such as the Sun god which in Egypt was briefly virtually a monotheistic God. Lesser gods can be very limited in their powers and roles. When Alexander the Great declared he was a god and when the Greeks accepted this claim, there was no ludicrous sug ...[text shortened]... le in Ireland (for example) is a superficial cloak for what are actually pagan beliefs.

Alexander the Great died and never arose from the grave proving he was not much of a god. 😏

Originally posted by RJHinds
Alexander the Great died and never arose from the grave proving he was not much of a god. 😏

How do you know he did not rise from his grave?
Maybe he did.

Maybe he is waiting for the right moment?

YOU DO NOT ACTUALLY KNOW

Originally posted by Agerg
Actually I didn't require or assume that, indeed my argument in the OP actually relies on the assumption Pascal was thinking of only one god! I was merely taking his flawed reasoning and showing how maths suddenly doesn't work anymore when we apply it also to a Jew and a Muslims conception of the ONLY "G"od (since from their perspective your god is incorrect). I don't have to stop with those gods either.

Your entire argument relies upon the possibility of an endless number of gods, when Pascal's Wager considers no such thing. Essentially, you are using a strawman argument by distorting Pascal's statement.

I can say the sky is blue, and you can turn around and declare my statement false and ignorant by introducing the color of the sky on an infinite number of other planets. Obviously my statement is meant to be confined to the sky over the planet Earth. You can talk all you want about all the other planets, but in doing so, you are presenting a strawman argument.

Originally posted by sumydid
Your entire argument relies upon the possibility of an endless number of gods, when Pascal's Wager considers no such thing. Essentially, you are using a strawman argument by distorting Pascal's statement.

I can say the sky is blue, and you can turn around and declare my statement false and ignorant by introducing the color of the sky on an infinite numbe ...[text shortened]... you want about all the other planets, but in doing so, you are presenting a strawman argument.

Yes my argument does rely on an endless number of gods and YES, Pascal's argument considers no god other than the one he believes in - and if it was a different god that exists then the consequences for guessing right might be radically different -- that is why this wager is crap.

Also your analogy is crap because the skies of other planets have no impact on the measurable blueness of our sky whereas the possibility of other gods has a lot of impact on the credibility of a wager for which the likeliest outcome cannot be assessed.

Originally posted by Agerg
This isn't so much meant to be an interesting thread topic more than it is intended to be a reminder for theists who don't know one of the essential problems with Pascals wager. I'll proceed by assuming the logic is valid...

Either God exists or he doesn't (so a fifty fifty chance then)
Then
If I'm a Christian we have:
P(Bible God) = 1/2
If I'm a Musli ...[text shortened]... robabilities of events in a sample space is equal to 1



So where did I go wrong? 😕

So you're aware your thinking is retarded, but you stand by it.

Originally posted by wolfgang59
How do you know he did not rise from his grave?
Maybe he did.

Maybe he is waiting for the right moment?

[b]YOU DO NOT ACTUALLY KNOW[/b]

Can't invest in that. Dude. We can make stories up all day long.

Originally posted by apathist
So you're aware your thinking is retarded, but you stand by it.

explain, clearly demonstrating the person with whom I'm arguing with is not assuming their god its the only possible god