3 ms·
It sounds like what you're talking about is Pascals Wager[0] The idea being that belief in God pays of well if true. And is alright if false. Disbelief in God
by yathern 9y ago
It sounds like what you're talking about is Pascals Wager[0]
The idea being that belief in God pays of well if true. And is alright if false. Disbelief in God pays off poorly if true, and alright if false. Therefore, any logical person ought to be a Christian, since the consequences of belief are net positive either way. Or so the thought goes.
As a person of faith, I will say that this thought experiment is fairly flawed. For one, you must apply Pascals wager to all faith systems simultaneously if you want to be sure you get the best outcome. But of course, it's not equally likely that Pastafarianism is the one true way as is Buddhism as is Atheism. How do you weight the possibilities in such a way to do an honest analysis? These things are based on what you believe already - so then the question of what to believe becomes recursive, really.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_Wager https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_Wager
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- borplk 9y ago> The idea being that belief in God pays of well if true. And is alright if false. Disbelief in God pays off poorly if true, and alright if false. That makes lots of assumptions about what God is and how he behaves.
- adnam 9y ago.
- edanm 9y agoNot... really? I mean, obviously atheism is a pretty broad thing (just like "religion", or even "Christianity" encompasses many views). But for a lot of people, the essence of atheism isn't about anything to do with final judgement. It's just... not believe that God exists. For lots of atheists, it's not a rebellion of anything like that. We don't believe in God in pretty much the same way you probably don't believe in Shiva.
- yathern 9y agoWell I'm paraphrasing Pascal's Wager which is about the Christian God - and the options therein of being heaven or hell.