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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   31505 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 21, 2025

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Isn't doing nothing the most foolish option, due to Pascal's wager?

The wager presupposes too much. What if God wanted burnt offerings or specific prayers and not just belief? What if she's really pissed you imagined her as a bearded dude once?

Then it's in your interest to estimate the probability space and act accordingly. Not to assume everything magically cancels.

Throwing up your hands and doing nothing is lazy and irresponsible, considering the stakes.

Pascal was quite right to criticize this attitude of carelessness or dismissal in Pensées 195:

Before entering into the proofs of the Christian religion, I find it necessary to point out the sinfulness of those men who live in indifference to the search for truth in a matter which is so important to them, and which touches them so nearly.

Of all their errors, this doubtless is the one which most convicts them of foolishness and blindness, and in which it is easiest to confound them by the first glimmerings of common sense, and by natural feelings.

For it is not to be doubted that the duration of this life is but a moment; that the state of death is eternal, whatever may be its nature; and that thus all our actions and thoughts must take such different directions according to the state of that eternity, that it is impossible to take one step with sense and judgment, unless we regulate our course by the truth of that point which ought to be our ultimate end.

There is nothing clearer than this; and thus, according to the principles of reason, the conduct of men is wholly unreasonable, if they do not take another course.

On this point, therefore, we condemn those who live without thought of the ultimate end of life, who let themselves be guided by their own inclinations and their own pleasures without reflection and without concern, and, as if they could annihilate eternity by turning away their thought from it, think only of making themselves happy for the moment.

Yet this eternity exists, and death, which must open into it, and threatens them every hour, must in a little time infallibly put them under the dreadful necessity of being either annihilated or unhappy for ever, without knowing which of these eternities is for ever prepared for them.

This is a doubt of terrible consequence. They are in peril of eternal woe; and thereupon, as if the matter were not worth the trouble, they neglect to inquire whether this is one of those opinions which people receive with too credulous a facility, or one of those which, obscure in themselves, have a very firm, though hidden, foundation. Thus they know not whether there be truth or falsity in the matter, nor whether there be strength or weakness in the proofs. They have them before their eyes; they refuse to look at them; and in that ignorance they choose all that is necessary to fall into this misfortune if it exists, to await death to make trial of it, yet to be very content in this state, to make profession of it, and indeed to boast of it. Can we think seriously on the importance of this subject without being horrified at conduct so extravagant?

This resting in ignorance is a monstrous thing, and they who pass their life in it must be made to feel its extravagance and stupidity, by having it shown to them, so that they may be confounded by the sight of their folly. For this is how men reason, when they choose to live in such ignorance of what they are, and without seeking enlightenment. "I know not," they say ..."

How can you estimate the probability space on a thing which, as the wager argues, is fundamentally unknowable through reason? Shouldn't every possible God be equally probable in a situation of zero knowledge?

The wager only works because it smuggles in the assumption that it's Christianity or nothing, but this is an unproven assumption.

It may still be possible to estimate things that are more likely. In fact, it would be extremely surprising if it were literally impossible to do that, if everything were exactly equal.

It doesn't require that it be Christianity or nothing. If there's more than one religion/source of infinite concerns in question, it'll endorse the course of action with the highest expected value.

Pascal's Wager is compelling because it claims to prove a benefit through logic. For the argument to still hold, may be possible isn't enough. I also have opposite intuitions and would find it incredibly surprising if we could logically go from zero knowledge to greater than zero knowledge.

If what you mean by more than one religion/source of infinite concerns is the modern version of Pascal's Wager that doesn't specify a religion and just says you should pick one, that version is still assuming a limited list of religions rather than the unconstrained list of any possible religion that a state of zero knowledge would require.

Are you saying that you think that all chances of infinite rewards cancel exactly? And that you have precisely zero knowledge about this? No hunches whatsoever? You couldn't even come up with some mild leanings if you put a year's diligent work into it?

I don't think that it requires a finite list of religions; you should be able to calculate the expected value across a countable number of courses of action.

I don't see how it could be otherwise than that they cancel out exactly.

Deciding a course of action is more likely than another action to get those infinite rewards would require some knowledge of God, knowledge that the Wager specifically excludes. The only state which is logically possible in our state of complete ignorance is therefore one where every action is equally likely to lead to infinite rewards. This would cancel out the infinite reward part when deciding which of two actions is better, as both are equally likely to get you there.

How would you go about figuring out which actions are more likely to lead to infinite rewards in this situation? Whence comes this knowledge about the unknowable?

knowledge that the Wager specifically excludes.

Are you saying in that Pascal says so? Ignore that. Arguments matter in their idealized form, not their historical articulations.

How certain are you that we are completely ignorant? In the case where we are not completely ignorant, are there any possibilities that are at all more likely? (E.g. would "do good things" have better expected value than the contrary? Would some religion proposing some deity slightly increase the subjective chance of that deity existing (as presumably they should be evidence)? etc.)

I think that religions that claim revelation are at least more likely than the negation of those religions, and largeness is probably also a mildly positive sign for a religion. I further think that, even ignoring that, there's a decent chance that moral realism is true, in which case our ethical intuitions are more likely to be courses of action that are approved of by the divine.

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