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What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:04 pm
A problem with Pascal's wager, is in the very title. You are wagering. Really you shouldn't wager at all. You should rather try to seek knowledge.
And this I feel all religions teach. They teach you shouldn't be basing your life on what you don't know but trying to attain knowledge and follow what you know.
There is a verse in Quran that says "And do not follow what you have no knowledge of" and says "Do you say about God what you don't know?".
As far as the fear aspect of religion goes, it should be reformed into, there is a consequence for disbelieving in the religion, therefore, you better make sure the religion is wrong if you are not going to follow it.
And I think this is a fair request from those whom believe in those type of religions. The reason is because they feel there is a huge consequence for disbelieving in the religion. They believe the consequence for disbelieving in the religion is to be tortured and tormented forever. Moreover, they believe it's "evil" and "greatly wrong" to disbelieve in the religion.
Now of course, none of this is reason for people to believe in the religion, but it's a logical and reasonable reason to take it seriously if and only if one doesn't know it's wrong.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:09 pm
Still beating the "everyone who believes in god knows they exist" nonsense out, I see. You not worked out how wrong that is yet?
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:13 pm
(This post was last modified: August 28, 2012 at 3:14 pm by Anomalocaris.)
(August 28, 2012 at 3:04 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: And this I feel all religions teach. They teach you shouldn't be basing your life on what you don't know but trying to attain knowledge and follow what you know.
Actually, I can't think of a single religion that teaches this.
All religions uniformly teach: If you don't know something, make shit up and then base your life on it.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:17 pm
Mystic Knight Wrote:They teach you shouldn't be basing your life on what you don't know but trying to attain knowledge and follow what you know.
And for this very reason, all religions should be dismissed.
MK, I do not mean any offense by this, but your threads come across as less about hypothesizing why some don't believe in god and more about justifying your own reasons for believing.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:17 pm
(August 28, 2012 at 3:04 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: A problem with Pascal's wager, is in the very title. You are wagering. Really you shouldn't wager at all. You should rather try to seek knowledge. And this I feel all religions teach. They teach you shouldn't be basing your life on what you don't know but trying to attain knowledge and follow what you know. You feel this eh? Well, let's have us a look-sie?
Quote:There is a verse in Quran that says "And do not follow what you have no knowledge of" and says "Do you say about God what you don't know?".
What, precisely, do you (or anyone else) know about a god?
Quote:As far as the fear aspect of religion goes, it should be reformed into, there is a consequence for disbelieving in the religion, therefore, you better make sure the religion is wrong if you are not going to follow it.
Reform the fear into reformed fear, rgr. Face it, you want hellfire but you're uncomfortable proposing it.
"You'd better make sure that bricks don't fly before you decide not take a flight on one."
Quote:And I think this is a fair request from those whom believe in those type of religions. The reason is because they feel there is a huge consequence for disbelieving in the religion. They believe the consequence for disbelieving in the religion is to be tortured and tormented forever. Moreover, they believe it's "evil" and "greatly wrong" to disbelieve in the religion.
You have feelings, they have feelings, we all have feelings. Unimpressive.
Quote:Now of course, none of this is reason for people to believe in the religion, but it's a logical and reasonable reason to take it seriously if and only if one doesn't know it's wrong.
It is neither logical nor reasonable.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:26 pm
This thread is irrelevant to the issue of believing God or disbelieving in him.
I've made it clear time and time again, I don't believe in the type of God that tortures people for disbelieving.
I even made a poem defying such a God here:
http://atheistforums.org/thread-13909.html
It rather has to do with how we should rationally deal with religions that threaten people with consequences of disbelief.
I think the rational thing is to investigate the religion and become sure it's wrong if you are not going to follow it.
I feel I have done that with regards to the religions that teach there is consequence for disbelief.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:54 pm
(August 28, 2012 at 3:26 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: This thread is irrelevant to the issue of believing God or disbelieving in him.
I've made it clear time and time again, I don't believe in the type of God that tortures people for disbelieving.
I even made a poem defying such a God here:
http://atheistforums.org/thread-13909.html
It rather has to do with how we should rationally deal with religions that threaten people with consequences of disbelief.
I think the rational thing is to investigate the religion and become sure it's wrong if you are not going to follow it.
I feel I have done that with regards to the religions that teach there is consequence for disbelief.
And we have made it clear time and again that whether a god tortures people for disbelieving does not in itself make the existence of said god either more credible or less credible.
The only god that can, even in principle, be credible is one who can be shown to inevitably possess a combination of testable characteristics that must be unique to this god.
There is no overwhelming reason, other than your flimsy wishes, why if any god exist, he must or must not torture people for fun.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 3:57 pm
Quote:They teach you shouldn't be basing your life on what you don't know but trying to attain knowledge and follow what you know.
I can not possibly disagree with you more on that point.
Religions teach that they have all the answers already.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 4:22 pm
(This post was last modified: August 28, 2012 at 4:25 pm by Mystic.)
(August 28, 2012 at 3:54 pm)Chuck Wrote: (August 28, 2012 at 3:26 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: This thread is irrelevant to the issue of believing God or disbelieving in him.
I've made it clear time and time again, I don't believe in the type of God that tortures people for disbelieving.
I even made a poem defying such a God here:
http://atheistforums.org/thread-13909.html
It rather has to do with how we should rationally deal with religions that threaten people with consequences of disbelief.
I think the rational thing is to investigate the religion and become sure it's wrong if you are not going to follow it.
I feel I have done that with regards to the religions that teach there is consequence for disbelief.
And we have made it clear time and again that whether a god tortures people for disbelieving does not in itself make the existence of said god either more credible or less credible.
The only god that can, even in principle, be credible is one who can be shown to inevitably possess a combination of testable characteristics that must be unique to this god.
There is no overwhelming reason, other than your flimsy wishes, why if any god exist, he must or must not torture people for fun.
Here is sort of line of reasoning I've had for a long time. Greatness is founded in a living eternal reality, and like greatness can be perceived, so can this trait be seen as an essential trait of it. The foundation of all greatness cannot be other then ultimate greatness, for ultimate greatness is included in greatness (all together).
Once we derive ultimate greatness exists, we know it must have some essential attributes, for if it didn't have them, it would not be ultimately great.
These include being compassionate, merciful, loving, forbearing etc. How do we know this? Well through the greatness that has descended into our souls and is the foundation of our souls along with what said earlier. We been given some knowledge of what is essential to being ultimately great.
(August 28, 2012 at 3:57 pm)Minimalist Wrote: Quote:They teach you shouldn't be basing your life on what you don't know but trying to attain knowledge and follow what you know.
I can not possibly disagree with you more on that point.
Religions teach that they have all the answers already.
This doesn't contradict that they teach in principle to follow knowledge, it's just they claim they teach much of this knowledge to be followed.
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RE: What should replace Pascal's wager in my opinion.
August 28, 2012 at 4:27 pm
(August 28, 2012 at 3:04 pm)MysticKnight Wrote: Now of course, none of this is reason for people to believe in the religion, but it's a logical and reasonable reason to take it seriously if and only if one doesn't know it's wrong. Nah, I don't think Pascal's wager is a reasonable logic to use.
Pascal's wager can be used to argue for almost any religion and it doesn't explain why one religion has a greater likelihood of being the correct religion over the others. For example, a Christian might use this argument by only counting Christianity into the wager while excluding the other faiths which he doesn't believe in. That's the problem, and that's why Pascal's wager is not a rational argument even on a basic level. It seems to imply that our faith is just a type of gamble for salvation and that it is reliant on a type of calculation of risk and possibilities based on pre-conceived ideas.
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