"If I am right, I go to heaven, if you are right, you die anyway."

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garbonzo

Registered Senior Member
What is that called again? This came from some old philosopher? What's it called again? Thanks.
 
Pascal's Wager, although the emphasis is more on the penalty for being wrong, that is, if the non-believer is wrong, they go to hell.

But of course it has problems, one being the assumption that there can only be one type of god, the Christian one.
 
...and one type of judgment; the Vatican's.

Biggest drawback: hedging your bet on that assumption may well mean condemning delusional young females to burn at the stake and taking away the lives, homes and freedom of peoples considered 'pagan' - i.e. breaches of a secular morality you may hold dear.
 
Jeeves said:
...and one type of judgment; the Vatican's.

Biggest drawback: hedging your bet on that assumption may well mean condemning delusional young females to burn at the stake and taking away the lives, homes and freedom of peoples considered 'pagan' - i.e. breaches of a secular morality you may hold dear.
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Popular renditions of extreme communism/eugenics also placed their eggs in one basket too ... with a lot more catastrophe, loss of life and destruction too I might add.

IOW even the "you die anyway" perspective can rain on quite a few people's morality, secular or otherwise.
 
lightgigantic said:
Popular renditions of extreme communism/eugenics also placed their eggs in one basket too ... with a lot more catastrophe, loss of life and destruction too I might add.
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What is communism/eugenics? How did it get into the equation?
The choice is not between the popular "rendition" of one extreme ideology or another; it's between placing yourself under [the current version of] a set of religious laws or cleaving to your own.
 
The thought experiment breaks down when one realizes that it takes very little time to:

--be forgiven by a forgiving deity, and there to escape it's wrath, after a fulfilling lifetime of misbehavior.

--let one's hair down, after discovering one has been too long following the hollow edicts of a lately-proven, non-existent deity.
 
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Jeeves said:
The choice is not between the popular "rendition" of one extreme ideology or another; it's between placing yourself under [the current version of] a set of religious laws or cleaving to your own.
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Before one places oneself under anything, or refuses to do so, it would behoove that one understand the exact formulations and requirements.

This -

"If I am right, I go to heaven, if you are right, you die anyway."
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is not how Pascal formulated his wager.


More importantly, to the best of my knowledge, no existing religion has that rendition, nor Pascal's original as part of their doctrine or requirements.

IOW, you are working yourself up over a mistake, a misunderstanding.
 
@wynn --

Yup, most theologians won't go anywhere near Pascal's Wager. They tend to recognize it for the crap that it is.
 
Kony, Hitler, and Romney can then all escape the ramifications of their evil, pain, suffering, and anger-causing ways, as they were more than likely tortured into that behavior since childhood, by the same sort of evil, pain, suffering, and anger-causing ways.
Kony, Hitler, and Romney realize they are forgiven regardless of what they do, and gain the insight that those who programmed them since childhood into evil, pain, suffering, and anger-causing ways, could also be forgiven by such a weird deity**

**(This is supposed to break the cyclical spell in the minds of those that recast the evil, pain, suffering, and anger-causing ways).
 
Arioch said:
@wynn --

Yup, most theologians won't go anywhere near Pascal's Wager. They tend to recognize it for the crap that it is.
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If I believe in Heaven, then good for me, it doesn't mean i'll get in by any means. If I don't believe in Heaven who gives a hoot, all I need to do is be a good man or women to my friends and neighbors and I will be accepted by God, if he doesn't accept me, the moral man, then I didn't want to go anyways.
 
Knowledge91 said:
If I believe in Heaven, then good for me, it doesn't mean i'll get in by any means. If I don't believe in Heaven who gives a hoot, all I need to do is be a good man or women to my friends and neighbors and I will be accepted by God, if he doesn't accept me, the moral man, then I didn't want to go anyways.
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Hey Knowledge, how did you get unbanned? :shrug:

Not everyone believes what you believe and it doesn't mean that what you believe is right. This guy believes that as long as you believe Christ is your savior, you will be saved and go to Heaven.
 
Absolution.........


The essential part of the formula (the words which must be said for the absolution – and the entire Sacrament of Penance – to take effect, or, in Church law terms, be "sacramentally valid") are: "I absolve you from your sins". Absolution of sins most importantly forgives sins (and, when done before death, ensures one dies in a "state of grace", able to eventually enter heaven); but it also allows the valid and non-sinful reception of the sacraments (especially the Eucharist at Mass), the lawful exercise of ecclesiastical offices and ministries by laity or clerics, and full participation in the life of the Church.
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So if you kill millions of people intentionally you can get absolution from your bad ways and still get into "heaven" , this seems to let everyone in no matter how good or bad they were and that would make me want to avoid the place with people like that in there already!
 
garbonzo said:
Hey Knowledge, how did you get unbanned? :shrug:

Not everyone believes what you believe and it doesn't mean that what you believe is right. This guy believes that as long as you believe Christ is your savior, you will be saved and go to Heaven.
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Haha. Read the first sentence of my post, chief.
 
The fallacy, of course, is that if a god exists, he isn't fooled by lip-service; if no god exists, service is unnecessary.
So, if you profess to believe, just in case, it's for the benefit of other men - it's not about heaven or hell; it's about political expediency. That's where one is in danger of compromising one's moral standards, to fall in line with prevailing dogma.
What profiteth it a man to gain high office if he lose his integrity? (On the other hand, better to assume protective colouring than lose one's head.)
 
wynn said:
Before one places oneself under anything, or refuses to do so, it would behoove that one understand the exact formulations and requirements.
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Not true. There are a nigh infinite number of things in the world one could buy in to. There is not infinite time to assess each one. We have to do some amount of guessing, even it we risk rejecting some things that might be legit. This gives rise to "if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck..." It's not ideal, but it has to be done.

Your wisdom is a direct result of how well you can do it and get it right.
 
Knowledge91 said:
Haha. Read the first sentence of my post, chief.
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That's what I am pointing out. He believes that if he believes in Jesus as his savior HE WILL get into Heaven. Only believing is necessary. That is what he BELIEVES. You cannot say otherwise. That is his opinion.
 
garbonzo said:
That's what I am pointing out. He believes that if he believes in Jesus as his savior HE WILL get into Heaven. Only believing is necessary. That is what he BELIEVES. You cannot say otherwise. That is his opinion.
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So guy #1 BELIEVES he is going to Heaven, and he BELIEVES that BELIEVING is enough to get one into Heaven, regardless of ones deeds?

PROBLEM: I also get into Heaven and If he's a sinner (pervert, liar, murder, etc) im going to toss his ass to Hell.
 
@Knowledge --

That's only if your beliefs are correct, and there's zero evidence of that.
 
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