A Common Argument For Religious Belief In Pascal's Wager

Moreover, philosopher William Clifford states in his piece, The Ethics of Belief, that "it has been judged wrong to believe on insufficient evidence, or to nourish belief by suppressing doubts and avoiding investigation." The Wager provided no confirmation on God's existence or that believing in him is the right way of life. Since God is all knowing, he will know that the basis of your belief is exclusively "not going to hell." Pascal took no account of God's power in knowing of and about his beings. In this case, it is useless to believe that he exists since he will know that deep down in your heart, you do not believe in him for the right

1. Examine the strengths and weaknesses of the argument for the existence of God based on religious experience. (18) 2. ‘The argument merely indicates the probability of God and this is of little value to a religious believer.’ Discuss. (12)

Pascal’s Wager is an argument that tries to convince non-theists why they should believe in the existence of the Christian god. Pascal thinks non-theists should believe in God’s existence because if a non-theist is wrong about the existence of God they have much more to lose than if a theist is wrong about the existence of God.

In this essay I will discuss the ontological problem of the existence of God and discuss Pascal’s Wager and how it solves the issue. The problem with the proof of the existence of God is that it is not something we will know for sure until our dying day. We can speculate and bet on his existence and “feel” his presence but at this point it is just that, only a bet. This wager is famous for opening up minds to look at the problem in a bigger picture. The problem with the existence of God is not in the answer but instead in the question. Pascal is responsible for refocusing this discussion on God to the bigger problem of the existential context of human life. In a way this can all be broken down to very black and white terms “Either God is or he is not.” But upon looking further we realize that this is a much bigger issue with many grey areas than something as simple as ‘is or is not’.

In his article, On Being an Atheist, H.J. McCloskey tried to show that atheism is a more reasonable and comfortable belief than that of Christianity.   McCloskey argued against the three theistic proofs, which are the cosmological argument, the teleological argument and the argument from design.   He pointed out the existence of evil in the world that God made.   He also pointed out that it is irrational to live by faith. According to McCloskey, proofs do not necessarily play a vital role in the belief of God.  Page 62 of the article states that "most theists do not come to believe in God as a basis for religious belief, but come to religion as a result of other reasons and factors."  However, he feels that as far as proofs serve theists,

James(1897) argues that certain actions and convictions need pre-existing beliefs which do not require sufficient evidence. He uses Pascal’s Wager as an example – James (1897) argues Pascal’s Wager may force individuals in choosing to either believe in God or not, regardless of there being sufficient evidence to prove the existence of the former or latter. However, James (1897) argues that different propositions

William James- says that a person is entitled to believe in god for purely prudential reasons if the belief provides a “vital benefit” and if no decision about theism can be made on the basis of the evidence available. “CHOICES” you choose your own fate.

In this paper I will contrast the ways that Blaise Pascal and Saint Anselm of Canterbury attempted to convince people to believe in God. Before getting into the two arguments I should first clarify a few key terms. Firstly, the difference between ordinary and religious beliefs. An ordinary belief is exactly what it sounds like, it’s a typical belief based on adequate evidence. An example would be “I believe the sky is blue because I’ve observed it as blue countless times”. Religious beliefs on the other hand, are not based on reasoning, but instead “Sola Fide”, or faith alone suffices, meaning that these beliefs are based only on trust that the proposition is true. A basic example of a religious belief would be “God exists” despite a lack of evidence for the claim. The major conflict between the two different types of beliefs is that in ordinary belief its considered shame worthy to belief something without have reasons to support it while belief without evidence is the core of religious belief. Another key term that must be understood to understand the arguments is “faith seeking understanding”. This idea was championed by Anselm and is crucial to understanding his argument. In short, he means that if someone begins with just faith in God then through that God will help them attain understanding.

A common argument used to disprove the existence of God is Pascal’s Wager. This argument states that it is more rational to believe in God as you will be rewarded. If God existed, and the person believed in God, he would be rewarded. If the person did not believe, he would be punished .If God did not exist it would make no difference. For this reason it would be more rational to believe in God rather than to not. Pascals Wager was defined by seventeenth century Philosopher Blaise Pascal. The argument can be standardised as follows:

Pascal’s Wager states that you cannot be certain whether God exists or not, but it is better to “bet” on God. If you bet on God and he does exist, you get eternal happiness. If he does not exist and you bet on him, you get nothing, but you do not lose anything. If you bet against God and he does exist, you lose eternal happiness. If he does not exist, you get nothing.

Pascal argues that it is irrational to not believe in God. This claim is made by first stating that God either exists or does not exist. Those are the only two options. Logically, one cannot prove that either of the propositions are undoubtedly true. One must wager whether to believe that God does exist or God does not exist.

How deep dishonesty runs in Christianity can be gauged by one of the most popular Christian arguments for belief in God: Pascal’s wager. This "wager" holds that it’s safer to "believe" in God than not to believe, because God might exist, and if it does, it will save "believers" and condemn nonbelievers to hell after death. This is an appeal to pure chicanery. It has absolutely nothing to do with the search for truth. Instead, it’s a time for Christians to abandon honesty and intellectual integrity, and to pretend that lip service is the same thing as actual belief. If the God of Christianity really exists, I find it compelling, how it would judge the hypocrites who assume this particularly faint-hearted "wager." Moreover, christians are closing

I find superdominance is a reasonable/logical philosophical argument for the belief of God. Blaise Pascal’s justification of theism and his wager for God is a sound argument. Blaise Pascal was a French philosopher of the 17th century whose book Penésses, a posthumous collection of his work, supports the existence of God through a unique argument. I support the claim that the existence of God cannot be proven or disproven so then we must wager that God exists. If he exists and we believe in him then when we die we will get the best outcome whereas the worst outcome will come from wagering against God. Therefore if God does not exist you lose nothing from believing in him.

    In the gambling world bets are made based on odds, the probability or likelihood that something would happen. In the court of law, cases are decided upon by the weight of evidence presented by the respective parties. The common link between these general scenarios is that decisions are made based on some outside evidential factor. The more probable something is likely to happen, or the more evidence presented in favor or opposed to something, the greater the tendency that a decision will coincide with that probability or evidence. This kind of logic has also been used when arguing about the existence of God. It has been argued that God’s existence is necessary based on the logic

I enjoyed reading Pascal’s wager so much that I decided to write my paper on him. I’m going to dig deeper into his background and answer key questions like what is the relationship between faith and knowledge? Is faith in god justified? Why? How? In matters of faith and relationship with God, is the question of the existence of God even relevant? Why or Why not? I am going to answers these key questions in the upcoming paragraphs. I will briefly explain the argument of Pascal’s wager and the reasoning behind it. Is there a God? Should I believe in God? People think about this question everyday. Pascal is famous, among other things for his wager argument. It was a groundbreaking theory at that time. It’s basically a risk vs