4 ms·

So much kneejerk reaction to this perspective - it's understandable, I suppose. If you are leveraging your lifestyle against your skillset to the fullest extent

by tspike 7y ago

So much kneejerk reaction to this perspective - it's understandable, I suppose. If you are leveraging your lifestyle against your skillset to the fullest extent possible, the idea that it could be unsustainable would be extremely threatening. Think of it this way- if he's right, you've insulated yourself from catastrophe. If he's wrong, you have given yourself a trajectory for permanent independence from employment. For people so good at optimization problems, this seems a no-brainer to me!

ehnto 7y ago
That's also the premise of Pascal's wager. By their reasoning, believing in God has a low risk, and high reward. You pray a bit, go to church, and you could end up in heaven. Whereas not believing in God could either be inconsequential, or land you in hell, low reward, high risk. So a betting man should always choose to believe in god. Of course we know that's not how it plays out. I have had fun with this thought of risk recently. It seems risk is hard to communicate between people, because sometimes people conflate the occurrence rate of the risk with the negative effects of the risk in question. So it's a low occurrence rate for an oil drill to spill, but the damage is the death of the ecosystem around it. You could argue the risk is both high and low for different reasons yet I don't often here people clarify that detail when talking about risk. In the scenario of my wage dropping, I would say it's a low risk for me, both because of my location and the economy my wage is based on, and because the damage of my wages dropping is low because I haven't leveraged my earnings. Little damage is to be done, AND the likelihood of a drop is also low. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_wager https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_wager
- saagarjha 7y ago
  > Of course we know that's not how it plays out. Usually because people don’t think the probabilities are 50-50.
- humanrebar 7y ago
  > Of course we know that's not how it plays out. Do we? I find his reasoning perhaps a little incomplete but still compelling. We don't have to benefit of his presence to fill in gaps in his reasoning, but a lot of the supposed gaps have to do with a misunderstanding of Christian "belief" (pisteuō). https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?t=nasb&strongs=g4100 https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?t=n... But this isn't analogous to Pascal's Wager anyway. That wager leans heavily on the concept of infinite positives and negatives. As great as being a successful programmer is, it's nowhere near infinitely better than alternative occupations and employment scenarios. So we're really talking about cost/benefit analysis with incomplete information... which describes most important decisions in life.
  - mnm1 7y ago
    Yes, the assumption that believing in a god that doesn't exist is only a minor negative in life is wrong and therefore the whole wager falls flat on its face. Of course, each person decides this on their own, but we know without any doubt that it's not a generalisation that can be made about everyone or even a significant percentage of people. We know this due to numerous counterexamples (myself included). In fact, it's purely opinion and conclusions simply cannot be based upon this assumption.
    - humanrebar 7y ago
      Your opinion is valid, but your reasoning is circular. You're basically saying there's no way there is a hell, so there isn't a good reason to avoid hell. The argument is that a life fully wasted on false assumptions is still better than an eternal hell. The same reasoning can be used to discount all sorts of black swan events, including programming becoming unviable some day, if we want to come back on topic. Pascal was basically arguing for respecting the ultimate black swan event, with the understanding that infinities skew any pragmatic calculations.
      - mnm1 7y ago
        No, that's not my argument at all. I said nothing at all about hell. I have no idea where you got that from, but surely not from my post. My argument is that believing in a god that doesn't exist is much more than the mere inconvenience that Pascal makes it out to me. It actually degrades life to the point where it might not be worth living. This is, of course, an evaluation that one can only make for themselves, but one that many have made. I'm saying that believing in god simply on the off-chance that he might exist, is vengeful, wrathful, and a piece of shit (as described in the bible) and will judge you on petty shit (as also described in the bible) in exchange for a life that's not worth living, where suicide is the best option, is not a wager any sane person would take. If it was as Pascal says, a minor inconvenience at worst, then Pascal's wager would make sense. Since it is a life-altering change that leads to one of the lowest possible qualities of life, then the wager no longer makes sense as the person faced with the wager now has to live a horrific life on the infinitesimally small, asymptotically to zero chance that said god above might exist. And that's before you get to the possility that if a god might exist, other gods might exist. How do I know that believing in the Christian god (which Pascal's wager is based upon) won't send me to hell when the Islamic god judges me. Or Zeus. Or Mars. Or Aphrodite. Or the Jewish god. Is he the same? No one knows. Or maybe an Aztec god. Or one of the thousands of religions of the world that have gods. Or some other imaginary deity. So which one should I believe in when I can only choose one out of thousands? Pascal and the entire church don't make a case for their god being the one in over two thousand pages of ranting. Pascal's wager is beyond fucking absurd. Then again, the idea of god itself is beyond fucking absurd as well. Especially for someone sane who wants to live their life as best as they can, not based on some imaginary wager and imaginary forces.

by tspike 7y ago

ehnto 7y ago

That's also the premise of Pascal's wager. By their reasoning, believing in God has a low risk, and high reward. You pray a bit, go to church, and you could end up in heaven. Whereas not believing in God could either be inconsequential, or land you in hell, low reward, high risk. So a betting man should always choose to believe in god. Of course we know that's not how it plays out. I have had fun with this thought of risk recently. It seems risk is hard to communicate between people, because sometimes people conflate the occurrence rate of the risk with the negative effects of the risk in question. So it's a low occurrence rate for an oil drill to spill, but the damage is the death of the ecosystem around it. You could argue the risk is both high and low for different reasons yet I don't often here people clarify that detail when talking about risk. In the scenario of my wage dropping, I would say it's a low risk for me, both because of my location and the economy my wage is based on, and because the damage of my wages dropping is low because I haven't leveraged my earnings. Little damage is to be done, AND the likelihood of a drop is also low. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_wager https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_wager

saagarjha 7y ago
> Of course we know that's not how it plays out. Usually because people don’t think the probabilities are 50-50.
humanrebar 7y ago
> Of course we know that's not how it plays out. Do we? I find his reasoning perhaps a little incomplete but still compelling. We don't have to benefit of his presence to fill in gaps in his reasoning, but a lot of the supposed gaps have to do with a misunderstanding of Christian "belief" (pisteuō). https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?t=nasb&strongs=g4100 https://www.blueletterbible.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?t=n... But this isn't analogous to Pascal's Wager anyway. That wager leans heavily on the concept of infinite positives and negatives. As great as being a successful programmer is, it's nowhere near infinitely better than alternative occupations and employment scenarios. So we're really talking about cost/benefit analysis with incomplete information... which describes most important decisions in life.
- mnm1 7y ago
  Yes, the assumption that believing in a god that doesn't exist is only a minor negative in life is wrong and therefore the whole wager falls flat on its face. Of course, each person decides this on their own, but we know without any doubt that it's not a generalisation that can be made about everyone or even a significant percentage of people. We know this due to numerous counterexamples (myself included). In fact, it's purely opinion and conclusions simply cannot be based upon this assumption.
  - humanrebar 7y ago
    Your opinion is valid, but your reasoning is circular. You're basically saying there's no way there is a hell, so there isn't a good reason to avoid hell. The argument is that a life fully wasted on false assumptions is still better than an eternal hell. The same reasoning can be used to discount all sorts of black swan events, including programming becoming unviable some day, if we want to come back on topic. Pascal was basically arguing for respecting the ultimate black swan event, with the understanding that infinities skew any pragmatic calculations.
    - mnm1 7y ago
      No, that's not my argument at all. I said nothing at all about hell. I have no idea where you got that from, but surely not from my post. My argument is that believing in a god that doesn't exist is much more than the mere inconvenience that Pascal makes it out to me. It actually degrades life to the point where it might not be worth living. This is, of course, an evaluation that one can only make for themselves, but one that many have made. I'm saying that believing in god simply on the off-chance that he might exist, is vengeful, wrathful, and a piece of shit (as described in the bible) and will judge you on petty shit (as also described in the bible) in exchange for a life that's not worth living, where suicide is the best option, is not a wager any sane person would take. If it was as Pascal says, a minor inconvenience at worst, then Pascal's wager would make sense. Since it is a life-altering change that leads to one of the lowest possible qualities of life, then the wager no longer makes sense as the person faced with the wager now has to live a horrific life on the infinitesimally small, asymptotically to zero chance that said god above might exist. And that's before you get to the possility that if a god might exist, other gods might exist. How do I know that believing in the Christian god (which Pascal's wager is based upon) won't send me to hell when the Islamic god judges me. Or Zeus. Or Mars. Or Aphrodite. Or the Jewish god. Is he the same? No one knows. Or maybe an Aztec god. Or one of the thousands of religions of the world that have gods. Or some other imaginary deity. So which one should I believe in when I can only choose one out of thousands? Pascal and the entire church don't make a case for their god being the one in over two thousand pages of ranting. Pascal's wager is beyond fucking absurd. Then again, the idea of god itself is beyond fucking absurd as well. Especially for someone sane who wants to live their life as best as they can, not based on some imaginary wager and imaginary forces.