Pascal's Wager

Pascal, a French mathematician, physician, and religious philosopher (Biography.com Editors), took a pragmatic approach to the widely discussed topic of God’s existence. In his piece Faith Without Reasoning, Pascal gives us a scenario penned “Pascal’s Wager,” which insists that from a gambler’s standpoint, we should always side with accepting God’s existence. Although after careful consideration it essentially fails to properly carry out its purpose, it is still considered one of the greatest…

choose to believe in him, I have wasted a good deal of piety, but otherwise I have escaped unscathed (Green). If a GCB does not exist and I do not choose to believe in him, no harm, no foul; by Pascal’s reasoning I have gained nothing and I have lost nothing. Where Pascal’s line of reasoning becomes a wager is when I choose how much each of the four outcomes outlined above are worth to me, by which I mean I assign a utility to each outcome. Whichever outcome has the highest expected utility,…

believe in the Christian God than not to. Using his same logic, when given more options it is in one’s best interest to explore the other religions because they might have a greater reward and no consequences. Pascal tries to cover all his bases in the wager by showing that if the Christian God does exist, and one does not believe in him he/she will receive infinitely great punishment. The Too Many Options objection counteracts this because one could believe in a completely different religion…

religion. There are varying opinions on Pascal’s work, with some, like Roger Scruton claiming that Pascal fails as a philosopher (specifically in the Wager) while others, like TS Eliot commend Pascal for “facing unflinchingly the demon of doubt” and attempting to deal with it (). In this instance, the issue is whether Pascal fails in giving practical reasons for authentic religious practice for those who are not currently seeking God (within the framework of the wager) or if he boldly faces the…

Thus, it is possible that Muhammad, and other religion’s prophets, had an implicit understanding of the concept of Pascal’s wager, and realized that they could control and promote desired action by promising rewards to those that are faithful, and punishments to those who are not. In sum, it might be possible to assume that the development of the judgement day was not based…

find the arguments persuasive. Therefore, Pascal attempted to formulate an argument, based on chance, that would persuade people to believe in God. After reading Pascal's Wager, Pascal wants you to believe that it would be in your best interest to believe in God. However, William James and numerous other philosophers explicitly reject Pascal’s argument and believe it is the weakest of all arguments for believing in the existence of God. The argument is presented as follows: if we believe in…

should decide between options in which evidence is non-existent or insufficient. To do this, James presents Pascal’s wager and the bearings the wager has. James acknowledges that “the option offered to the will by Pascal is not a living option” (94) as Pascal’s option offers us a dead hypothesis as there is “no tendency to act on it.” (95) It is here that James acknowledges that Pascal’s wager, like his own argument offers what initially seem to be dead hypotheses. However, James explains that…

Pascal’s Wager is a significant topic concerning the question of God’s existence wherein Blaise Pascal offers a pragmatic reason for believing in God. Pascal implies that we may never know whether or not God exists; however, theists will always have it better…

James and Pascal’s defences of faith in some of their most famous arguments, specifically Pascal’s, devalue faith by making faith selfish, providing an obvious out to faith, and making the decision of faith into a gamble, oddly, his devaluation of faith does not hurt his argument, it makes it easier to convince the skeptics. To prove that Pascal’s argument devalues faith and to understand why it doesn’t negatively affect his argument, it’s necessary to understand the whole argument. His…

Gerolamo Cardano's work made no big splash in his own time, because he worked at a time when mystical incantation was more valued than mathematical calculation. In other words, people did not look for the order in nature and did not develop numerical description of the events. Therefore, a theory of the effect of randomness on those events was bound to go unappreciated. The turning point for the scientifc revolution came in 1583, just seven years after Cardano's death. The scientifc revolution…