the other issue with Pascal's Wager is you can apply it to absolutely every religion, even ones you make up your self. A lot of old European thinkers seem to share the problem that they don't seem to realize Christianity isn't synonymous with all faith
+255ad With the thousands of Gods , Goddesses and deities worshipped throughout human history as well as the infinite number of possible deities hitherto unthought of, Pascal's wager becomes a bet on infinity, where you must throw a dart at one particular God, hope none of the other infinite number of deities exist or care about your beliefs. The bet becomes an impossible wager with no God more likely than the other. The only way to play the bet is to look at the evidence for each outcome and realise that all lack evidence, so it's probably best not to make the wager.
BagheerathePanther the problem with that is that you know there’s a 0% chance that something bad will happen to you. Even if you don’t believe in God or any type of religion I wouldn’t believe anyone who said they never even imagined of some being that at least started everything leaving out wether or not they’re good bad or anything else
@@victorortiz8977 For pascals wager to hold you have to not only believe in some being that started everything, but you have to believe in a being who will reward you eternally or punish you eternally based entirely on whether or not you guessed correctly if it exists, without sufficient evidence. THATS more ridiculous, and harder to believe than the idea an email can give you bad luck.
Recognition of the harmful ignorances of denominations seems to prove God. Most authentic believers will tell you the worst case for God is Judaism, Catholicism, Muslim, Christian etc etc
@@cassun603 Because, when you take denominational Christianity as flawed, and even downright evil sometimes, you then have to go back to the Word itself. That is what sets a person free. The prophetic word is so precise, that you have to be a complete idiot not to see it. But, it takes time and patience and a lot of work. In the end, the devout student is blessed beyond belief. Think about it, if you were the devil trying to subvert God, you would spend most of your time in churches!
@@kenbellchambers4577 If you take the bible as the word of god, then your very faith is flawed. You cannot cherry pick what parts of "God's word" to believe. You have to either take all of it or none of it. But since the Bible contradicts itself so many times, and if god is perfect, then the Bible can't be God's word.
@@cassun603 The apparent contradictions in the bible are due to first, not reading the whole book, and not reading it with an open mind. Secondly, translational errors. Hebrew is a difficult language and errors happen fairly easily, and thirdly, not seeking advice on apparent contradictions which have been satisfactorily resolved for hundreds of years. I was an atheist. I KNEW I was right. I read the bible with an open mind. I was no longer an atheist. After that, whenever I sought an explanation regarding contradictions, I found answers. The bible is a book so deep, that if you studied it for ever, it would surely still be quite able to surprise and enlighten. Please provide a few of the contradictions that you have encountered, and I may be able to help.
and also in the case of Christianity if you only believe in God because it is the best bet, from a Bible point of view that gives you eternity in hell because you don't believe in God by faith, so that means believing in God's existence without the 'true faith' part is no difference than if you just didn't believe. I think this is also another flaw in Pascal's wager. You can't just use your gambling & math skills to buy your ticket to heaven/eternal life. Faith is integral.
Patrick Van Gelder well with the major religions in the world they’re pretty cut and dry. What I mean by that is that the Abrahamic gods don’t have different punishments for those who worship other gods, and those who don’t at all. They all go to hell. Technically in Catholicism there are levels of hell, but honestly they all sound pretty bad, like burning on embers vs torn apart by demons. On the other hand there are some religions where faith isn’t completely necessary, or maybe a god that doesn’t care if we have faith in it, but that brings us back to the wager
I am a Christian, and I have to say your videos on religion, almost always, are near flawlessly objective. Being neither swayed nor nuanced one way or the other. Your true scientific observation is impressive. (sincere complement)
Gotta love the "Pascal's mugging" objection. A man walks up to you in the street and says: "hey, I'm God. Give me all your money as a testament to your faith, and I'll send you to heaven. If not, I'll send you to hell." Do you call his bluff and risk infinite loss, or fork over the cash in exchange for infinite reward?
Lolll Honestly I see your point. Simultaneously though, believing in God also doesnt cost as much as your whole fortune and if you gave up your whole fortune that would go against pragmatic idea. btw I'm not religious so plz dont get mad at me
@@timothymonaghan8875 ? This is just Pascals Wager which really doesn't matter which God you believe in (even though Pascal was a Christian). The main point is that being an atheist doesn't really benefit you compared to being religious (given that this religion promises a better after life)
Sorry, but i'm glad it's over. Spent 4 years listening to this stuff, stopped caring. I can't wait for some existentialism however, i wanna see how crash coarse handles this subject.
I heard that Pascal knew his own wager fell short somehow, and that a mathematical reasonable argument wasn't gonna change anyone's heart. That's why he concluded with his most famous quote: "The heart has its reasons that reason knows not".
That's the lovely thing about proper philosophical thinking: You don't even have to make a case for or against something. You can just honestly lay out the arguments, including some of those mentioned in favour of faith, and the unsatisfactory nature of some of those arguments will reveal itself to the observer without the presenter having to make the case himself.
On pascals wager, Hitchens once said that " I would presume divine sir, that you have some respect for intellectual honesty and for moral courage, and that you would look with favour on somebody who made an honest profession of unbelief then on someone who acceded to believe in you in the hope of a hand out"
Christopher Hitchens gave the best arguments against Pascal’s wager. His contributions would have been a welcome addition, but it’s possible the creators didn’t know, I only found his lectures, debates, and videos a few years ago.
I always had a hard time understanding the concept of a God who is benevolent, wise, and all-knowing and yet not all-empathizing. God, if you do exist, I'm living in the world you created, in the circumstances you put me in, with the body and brain and soul you granted to me. If my life didn't turn out as you would have liked, that's on you, buddy. And if, given my circumstances, I decided not to believe in God at all or to believe in some other god while also being a good person who treats others well, then that ought to be adequate to please you. And yet, supposedly, the Christian God's top concern is whether you believe in Him specifically and not other gods. It's truly bizarre.
One issue with Pascal's wager, is what if the God you're believing in is the "wrong god", and the real god will send you to their hell because of your worship of false gods/prophets...
+Knowka I think you would most likely have the best possible chance of going to a better place (assuming there is one) by being a murderous glory-seeking warrior. That would secure a good place in two or three religions... Most others would only net you one spot on the table of religions...
+Knowka If you follow that line or reasoning you have to go with the religion that has the highest rewards and the worst punishments. Allso it should be compatible with as many of those religions that do not require you to believe into them, just to live the way they think is right.
I came to the comments to ask the same thing. The Mormon/LDS Church believes in "degrees of glory" in the afterlife. The lowest tier for non believers still actually glory and better than earth life. The only place lower, Outer Darkness, is the worst of sinners -- those that deny God's existence (such as the soul of Lucifer himself)
+Knowka You're presuming that there must be one true religion for God, but that is not necessarily true. You can believe in a sort of God and not believe in any religion, say, all religions are man-made and are not from God, and if you can do that, the problem you're presenting will not be an issue in Pascal's Wager.
So, Pascal was a "practical coward?" Btw, I'm loving this. You tackled philosophy and religion like a badass. I have No complaints. Thank you all for these videos! 📚❤
Yes existentialism is coming up, one of the most important philosophies of the twentieth century. I really hope he covers French existentialists like Sartre and Camus.
+Andre Lee He will definitely cover both of them eventually, although Camus is an Absurdist, which, believe it or not, is actually not Existentialism (I think).
+ayernee +SergeantRobbinBobbin Camus did not like labels and he did reject titles like "existentialist" and "absurdist". However, many, including me, consider him an "existentialist" because of his ideas were heavily influenced by Kierkegaard and his friends Sartre and Merleau-Ponty. Camus partially differed from his contemporaries in his views of the mankind, the world and life's joys, which got him labeled an "absurdist" but he still remains an integral figure in the history of existentialism which formed much of the basis for his own philosophies expressed in L'Etranger and Le Mythe de Sisyphe.
Your lectures have caused me to study philosophy as an interest. It has made me look at things in a different way questioning every bit of detail I see. Thanks for existing
Indy's "leap of faith" makes for great movie stuff because the film was only 2D, however since Indy has 2 eyes, and parallax means that he'd have been able to see the "invisible bridge" as it was at a vastly different depth from his eyes than the rest of the pit... It was still a good optical trick, but one that wouldn't work IRL.
Not that scene. It was fairly well lit so you could see the chasm. Even if it wasn't, the light from whatever source he'd be carrying would illuminate the bridge brighter than the opposite wall of the chasm.
That's one of the scenes where I lost my suspension of disbelief. Even if Indy had only one good eye, simply moving his head in any direction would induce parallax. The next ten minutes of the movie I missed because I kept wondering how he could _not_ see the damn bridge.
The bridge was approached from one particular direction. What if the bridge was just wide enough to not be seen while approaching from that direction because of how it was painted, while after you take the first step it immediately became visible? Yeah it's not what's shown in the movie, but couldn't one alter the set to make it possible? I mean, if you can't move and the bridge is wider than the tunnel you come from, the paint can be disguised to include features to fool parallax.
You can't paint something to fool your perception of depth so that it appears to be farther away AND perfectly match the background on the other side. If you watch the movie again, you'll see that Indy is moving around, but the camera is in a fixed position. That's because the illusion will only work for the camera if it's in that exact spot. Once it moved, the illusion was broken. Nice cinematography, but wouldn't work IRL.
+Jeremy R Don't be too proud of this Theological terror you've constructed! It's abilty to gain followers is insignificant, next to the power of The Force! :D
You skipped the biggest criticism of Pascal's Wager: what if you're believing in the wrong deity? Darkmatter2525 explained it well; an atheist hears Pascal's Wager and converts to Christianity, then he dies and finds out he angered Allah and goes to hell.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but are not they the same God? Both religions descend directly from, and share their central deity with, Judaism, as the God in the old testament is the same as the God in the new testament and in the Qur'an, no? The God of all three religions is the God of Abraham, who is one of the foremost ancestors of Jesus and who is the father of Ishmael, a central figure in the ancestry of Islam.
Yes they are. The difference is that what God did after the Old Testament. Both of them were rooted from Torah. All of them are the same in the Torah but parted ways in the New Testament and Qur'an. Let us assume that the Old Testament was true. Sooo, it's either 3 of these possibilities are true.
Admittedly true, I was splitting hairs. But then, comes another interesting question - is agnosticism "better" than faith in the wrong deity? Is faith in the wrong God better or worse than faith in no particular God at all?
Neither, I can only suggest you one thing: Live your life to the fullest and don't let these holy books tell you what to do. There are 3 million deities and only one of them can be true. If God exists then most likely you're going to hell as the chances are less than one percent.
I'm a religious person for 18 years since I was born. Being freed from religion was the most liberating thing that happened to me. All thanks to crash course philosophy and all the debates about religion that I watched on youtube. It really taught me how to think rather than what to think.
as a recovering religious zealot some odd 20 years ago, I understand this completely and while I have no beef with religion, I have a beef with hierarchical structure/designs, people who sit at the top of the pyramid and are considered infallible and speak for god/gov't/whatever it may be. Also you are 100% correct in that I hate that most people don't learn to think for themselves, I'd rather see someone think for themselves and be wrong than not to think at all. At least some are trying to break from from the world's cultural indoctrination.
Watching philosophy videos and taking my two semester philosophy class has been made grateful to really know more about the Lord. Still, the most important thing is having a relationship with God, and not being stuck on religious rules and what other religious people tell you what to think. I do not know if you stopped believing in God along with freeing yourself from what others tell you to think. If so, I'm not going to lie, that does make me sad, but at the same time there is so much false doctrine we hear that people are quick to follow just because they are told what to think instead of how God wants us to think and see the world. I hope you do get close to God if you are not, and that it will bring you freedom and peace as it is doing for me, but that you will never be chained by false religious rules, false pro-God rules, false anti-God rules, and false traditions ever again!
I'm pretty disappointed you didn't mention any of the major problems with Pascal's Wager. His wager assumes only one religion - likely Christianity - and disregards all of the thousands of others we've created. If you don't believe in Islam, for example, regardless of if you believe in god, you still go to hell. Since there are so many religions, all or most of which promising endless post-mortem torture to any who don't follow or believe in their tenets, then by sheer probability, we can *all* expect to have an unpleasant afterlife if even one of those religions is true, and there's no way to tell which one it might be. They can't all be right, but they *can* all be wrong. Also, considering many of those gods are jealous, the atheists are better off. Wouldn't a jealous god be more forgiving if you lacked belief in any gods than if you actively blasphemed and worshipped a false god your whole life? Yeah. Ultimately, it goes back to what Marcus Aurelius (might have) said: "Live a good life. If there are Gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are Gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no Gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones."
Except that many religious people believe that none of us live an adequately just life on our own, so that plan won't work either. You have to see yourself as being awesome in order to get to that view, which is a sin of pride in itself. The reason that Christians believe Jesus was necessary is because living a "good life" that is up to God's standards is virtually impossible.
You didn't listen close enough... Pascal in essence said even if there is the tiniest .000000000000000000000001% chance that you could be believing in the correct god it is still better to take that minuscule chance than not to. So even if you pick the wrong god, from his point of view your still better off than not picking a god.
+you bin But we're not talking about the question, it's about the wager. Pascal sets up a false dichotomy that either there is a God who values belief in him or there doesn't exist one. But these aren't the only two options, in fact there are infinitely many options, you are only constrained by your imagination. One thinker has put forth the idea of a god that rewards atheism but punishes belief. You can think of a god that doesn't care if you don't believe, but if you are a theist who doesn't believe in him in just the way he wants, he will punish you. Again, the possibilities are infinite.
Pascal's wager pretty much applies to every religion or belief, so according to Pascal your best bet is to believe in every religion that exists or has existed, even if they contradict each other...
more accurately, you believe in the religion with the highest pay off In respect to the others. If there's a relatively neutral end proposed for non believers in a religion (such as Judaism) then you can "ignore" that religion safely. Pascal never addresses anything beyond Christianity/monotheism because the idea of multiple gods us philosophically untenable to him. So your choices are basically the "big" three: (little) Judaism has no penalty for morally acting non believers, Islam is relatively benign as well. Only Christianity promises eternal hell for failure to believe (dudes, what's up with that?) so Christianity is the only proposition he works with on his wager.
but the FSM, at least the versions that contains onions in their salsa, sends you to hell if you follow any religion or believe in a god, even in him. So if he exists, the best bet is to not believe in any god.
With Wildhide ??? read the bible and see what happened to the people that believed in Ba'al... is worse to believe in a different god than to not believe in any god at all.
if i'm not mistaken, pascal was basically okay with anyone with a decent faith, whether it was christianity or not. basically, you convert if you found out that some other faith had a greater chance of god-accuracy, but otherwise, your guess is as good as his. this is pragmatism without requirement, so only the ends really mattered.
So even though we doubt it and we still fake it as we believed it just in case we got punishment? After all, if god really exists will he or she knows that we are faking ? XD ok i am just messing up with what i just learnt
You can apply it to many religions as well. If there are 1000000000000... religions, believing in one of them is a better bet than not believing in any of them. If you don't believe there is 100% chance of punishment or nothing happening. If you believe in one, there is still a minuscule chance of being correct and getting rewarded.
+Bernie Patt This is only true for religions which have as a part of their dogma the concept of imminent damnation without salvation through faith in the religion's dogma. That's actually a ridiculously tiny portion of religions - Christianity, Islam, and the few religions that have branched off from those. For the vast majority of religions in human history (many of which still exist) the entire notion of salvation is an alien concept. You might be better off wagering on Shintoism, Hinduism, Wicca, or most forms of Buddhism if they're right, but there is minimal consequence to betting against them even if they are right. People seem to forget that the threat of damnation was a recruiting tool Christians used to convert people from all over the world from their original religions, and *that would only work if the original religion didn't also damn you for abandoning it*. This is why I'm so disappointed Crash Course never delved into the philosophy of other religions. The atheist/Christian split in western discourse is so dominant that westerners tend to not even be aware anymore how much their arguments revolve around Christianity to the exclusion of basically everyone else in the world (with the sometimes exception of Islam).
+Bernie Patt This is a statistics fail. The majority of humans on earth believe in the God of Abraham (Christian, Jew, Muslim). There are fewer than 10 major religions that account for the gods people generally believe in currently. Not 10000000000000 gods.
However, all religions do seem to worship the same entity, and I'm not talking about the Abrahamic ones. Even polytheistic religions such as Hinduism believe all of their deities combine to form a superdeity. Other polytheistic religions seem to upgrade worshippers of said deity into deity-like status. In the end, all religions worship the same God.
As a Christian, I really enjoyed watching this series! It (re)affirmed some of my beliefs, and made me wonder (not so much question) some other aspects of my beliefs, and religion in general. I think the writing is really good and Hank is just wonderful in presenting it :) Thanks ChrashCourse team! :)
Agreed! I think every Christian should evaluate their faith, reasoning, and beliefs. To avoid a focus on 'religion' and to seek a more meaningful basis than simply a means of self-identification or worse, tradition. I'm a Bible-believing disciple of Christ. And for this video, I agree Pascal's Wager is not the best reason to become a Christian. But in playing the odds, I prefer a teleological stance: we are here and the statistics are way too much in favor of a Creator. No matter how it was done, it had to have been done with a guiding force, because the chances of abstract development of the cosmos are too great.
Im a Christian and I enjoyed this segment very much. You did a good job trying to stay unbiased, Thank you for that Hank. Check out William Lane Craig for more Christian philosophy.
Indy’s leap of faith is one of my most favorite scenes! You kind of left out Indiana’s schooling by his father, which is to say, he was well versed in the mythology of Christianity. An enjoyable review overall.
But what if there's a god that will torture you if you believe in a god? Since that's just as plausible (same amount of evidence, after all) as a god that will torture you if you don't believe in them, then pascal's wager cancels itself out. (Edit: Alternatively, a god that tortures you if you believe in *any* god) For every theoretical god with a certain will (it wants you to believe in it) there is a theoretical god with an opposite will (it doesn't want you to believe in it, or any others). *So Pascal's wager always cancels itself out.* EDIT(x2): This argument is expanding Pascal's wager for *any* god. There's way more problems when one only applies it to the Christian god, like Pascal originally intended. (Thanks +Chris Seals) So basically, I'm just stripping Pascal's wager down to the risk/reward argument. (Thanks +N. Wasinger)
Logan White Then good for the people that believed that? I mean, if you want to pick a random religion to believe in because you have a feeling it's correct then knock yourself out. I'm just saying that pascal's wager is self-contradictory and not practically useful. I'm not asserting which religion is real.
That's actually not plausible, because you are postulating that a god exists, therefore it is only logical to believe in such a god (one that exists). Such a god would be unjust in punishing you for using logical deduction to come to the conclusion that it exists, because you are created with the ability to deduce truth for the sake of your existence (a trait given to you by a creator god in your scenario). You win your day in court, or such a god would be a Lord of Chaos, and it really wouldn't matter what you believe. Pascal's Wager stands.
To be clear: I mentioned that as a problem with Pascal's Wager. He was only thinking of his god. I don't see any evidence for any god so I'm atheist. :) And yes, most postulated gods are dicks ahah
man I'm loving this series, such an interesting yet well layed out format plus hanks humid takes the seriousness off the topics so it seems less like forced school and more like learning out if interest
This course was absolutely amazing !! I've always wanted to read about philosophy but found it hard to understand yet this course made it much easier. .. Make some more philosophy courses pleeease
You said about Pascal's Wager, but about David Mitchell's view on this? He said "What if there is an afterlife but you only go to it if you are an atheist?"
That kind of goes against most of the atheists view on the world. If there was an afterlife for atheists, who or what put them there? What happened to the theists? If there was a someone or something, is this place Hell for not believing in them? A big problem to that is where do theists go and why would the atheists have afterlife when most atheist don't believe in one.
Teanu Tamayo I don't have to have a ready answer for it. I'm doubtful any kind of afterlife exists, let alone any specific details. If we are totally honest then we admit that the prospect of an afterlife is so alien that if it were to be possible then anything would be possible. But as a pure hypothetical then life could be some kind of test to make sure that people don't delude themselves, so perhaps to join the afterlife society you need to prove that you aren't gullible enough to believe in god without evidence. If you fail the test then perhaps they kill you or cast you out or something equally hellish. Again it doesn't have to be realistic because there is no example of a logical afterlife given by theists either. There is no issues whatsoever with the assumption that there can exist an afterlife which favors atheists if afterlives can exist at all.
@@Neutomy it'd be like a reward mechanism for critical thinking and rationality.. Matrix operators testing if we realize it's a matrix or not.. And theists will be dismantles by the space overlords
God won't destroy you in hell for not worshipping Him, He'll destroy you in hell because you refuse to let go of evil when He finally destroys it from the universe forever so that everyone can live with fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore, with no more pain or death.
+jim gordon *Shrug* I can deal with that. I'd rather go to hell than abandon my ideals. 'Sides, a lot of my friends are either atheists or LGBT+ and I'd be happier spending eternity with them in without them in heaven.
The problem with Pascal's wager is that it makes it seem like the choice is between believing in one particular god or Atheism. However there are many different gods/goddesses/deities that people have worshiped for centuries and you might end up believing in the wrong one. If all your basing your belief in is Pascal's wager you're taking just as big a gamble as the nonbeliever.
+Brandon Hall Indeed the greatest problem of Pascal's Wager is that it limits the space of possibles to a universe with only one possible divinity. The wager becomes moot if the possibility of choosing one among many possible monotheistic divinities. And if one must consider a polytheistic supernatural cosmos, the logic matrix cannot even be constructed.
I don't believe in religion, but I'm still skeptical of multiple religions being a counter argument. If I have a 0.000000001% of going to heaven between religions or 0% with atheism, the smallest percentage is a reasonable risk.
+Luna Malie Your counter argument is flawed too. What if God decides to reward atheist with heaven, or rational thinkining people? Or for the sake of argument, people who like their stake medium rare? We don't and can't know what the entry conditions would be for a random God, not just each believe but each and any action might be a deal breaker for him.
+Jeremiah B hmm, when you say "you believe", you are implying that you have faith that there is this god you described. you have no evidence. you just believe there is, which is how faith can be descibed. you seemed to have sentenced yourself to eternal damnation with your not so well thought out comment. but I imagine you take this approach with the rest of your life. so it should not be much of a surprise to you. hopefully your brain is still developing and you still have plenty of time to work out a coherent philosophy on life. good luck with that by the way...
If you want to really understand history, read the entire kjv with an open mind. This will also open the road to understanding virtually all literature better, as the bible appears everywhere in classical works. It also opens many other doors to better understanding of our times. This is urgent. So, yes, pondering the existence of God should be at the very top of your list, permanently. [Do not expect to understand it, because you won't, don't skip lists of names, pay attention and try to pronounce them, Later you will be greatly rewarded for your patience.]
hey, the comments look good so far, no militant atheists claiming their belief is superior to Christians and no Christians telling people they are going to hell. woot woot. :D
+justin bouche militant atheists, I think you are going to far. Militan christians try to denie people rights, militant muslims explode, militant budists shank people etc. Since when is commenting on the internet on a video about religion and reasons of believe something militant?
First video of the series a have a mid-sized criticism for: talking about Pascal's Wager without mentioning the false dichotomy of either god or no god vs. the multitude of mutually exclusive religions is a major oversight.
+comb528491 This is empirically false. Many religions do not require the belief in any gods such as Buddhism. Others require belief in multiple gods such as Paganism. Also, people are not religions. An individual theist can have many theological differences with other theists.
KimBouncesFish I apologize for making it unclear. What I meant was that polytheistic religions such as Hinduism seem to believe that their Gods combine to form some superdeity. Other religions seem to upgrade worshipers of the deity to deity-like status. My guess is that all religions started out the same, but simply evolved.
***** Ah, an interesting point. I was referring to the Hindus. I see the reverse as happening. They first worshiped a monotheistic deity, and then started ascribing different personalities, started dividing this entity up to fit their worldview, and then started promoting Human worshipers of this deity to Godlike Status (Kinda how the Christians do with Jesus), and then, finally, went down to spirits after everything got weird.
The odds of watching it at 11: 30 are 1: 1440 because there are 60 minutes in an hour and 24 hours in a day. (not taking into account that 11: 30 occurs twice in a day). With over 23,000 views, it is bound to happen to some people. I was watching this at 11: 20 so I was pretty close too. But it is a fun coincidence when these things happen to you.
***** Forsooth! Great point comrade :) We now know that alchemy is bunkum [it has been totally replaced by chemistry done using the scientific method] but it was studied and practiced by Newton. Also, when he came to the limit of his understanding regarding the motion of the planets and the equations were not sufficient to describe the observed phenomena he then decided that the remainder must be the work of God. But, using Einsteins relativity we can now do those calculations on the remainder. It just goes to show that even the greatest of intellects is not immune to fallacious reasoning
+Pandemic Eloi.7 Don't be silly. You have to reach level 9000 naivety to think Pascal's wager has anything to offer. For starters, it begs the question: by presupposing the existence of heaven and hell. If they don't exist [and I don't know why any intelligent, freethinking, and not brainwashed adult would believe they do...] then Pascal's wager is meaningless.
I kinda love that one of the foremost guys in probability theory devised an argument for belief in a god rooted in bets and wagers. It just fits together so nicely.
You missed another large flaw in Pascal's Wager. The idea that believing in God gets you a ticket to Heaven is an assumption: a HUGE assumption. Believing in the Christian God could easily get you sent to Hell by Allah if Islam turns out to be correct. Perhaps Allah would be less angry at people that don't believe in him than those who actively worshipped a false god. Pascal's Wager equally supports all religions. Most religions punish you for believing in a different religion, and picking a religion at random is unlikely to get you the correct one, so perhaps remaining neutral is the best strategy. And really, since we know nothing about God, there could just be a God that only rewards atheists, because he finds rationality to be a virtue, rather than faith. A terrible argument all around, especially since I don't think I could ever force myself to believe anything; I'd feel dirty and wrong even trying.
Well, based off just the Christian interpretation, Hell is equal to everyone: the worst pain forever, so there probably isnt a tier system where atheists go to the 6th tier and false believers go to the first tier or something. However, if there are those kinds of religion (which is probably true considering the chances) then i see your argument panning out. It's a very rational way of thinking.
Jeremiah B From Islam.org (not some source trying to attack Islam), a Jahil-e-Muqassir is a non-believer who is aware of Islam, and is thus damned to Hell. Source: www.al-islam.org/faith-and-reason-ayatullah-mahdi-hadavi-tehrani/question-13-non-muslims-and-hell. I'm sure there are some Muslims who think decent atheists can make it into Heaven. I'm also sure that this is not the traditional belief.
Jeremiah B “This Book is not to be doubted…. As for the unbelievers, it is the same whether or not you forewarn them; they will not have faith. God has set a seal upon their hearts and ears; their sight is dimmed and grievous punishment awaits them.” Quran 2:1/2:6-2:10 “God’s curse be upon the infidels! Evil is that for which they have bartered away their souls. To deny God’s own revelation, grudging that He should reveal His bounty to whom He chooses from among His servants! They have incurred God’s most inexorable wrath. An ignominious punishment awaits the unbelievers.” Quran 2:89-2:90
He threw the dirt on after he crossed as evidence to others. In analogy, Indy traversed a gap in knowledge blindly, but discovering it's true nature, he left behind evidence as proof so that those that came after need not be blind with ignorance...
I have to disagree with both philosophies. I'm not gambling away my life, HOPING it works out. I'd rather work with what I know and learn and move forward from there. I'd argue THAT is pragmatism.
Well from the perspective of finite happiness vs infinite happiness, believing is the better option. Of course one would argue that the finite happiness might as well be infinite from a mortal's perspective if God doesn't exist, that's where the gamble comes in, either eternal happiness or less happiness (i say less happy rather than suffering because if you really believed, you'd probably be pretty happy with your life in most cases) than non-believers (unless you just find the greatest joy in believing in some religion, in which case, go for it bro) or the other side of coin is "eternal" (for mortals) happiness or eternal damnation. The positive outcomes and negative outcomes favor believing in god, but that's my personal take on this. There are other arguments against Pascal's Wager that are pretty good that i recommend checking out
+you bin the simplest rebuttal to pascal wager is that it assumes God's characteristics. God is equally likely to reward atheists and burn theists as he is to do it the other way around. Each possible scenario eventually averages out to a "not much" scenario.
TheTsugnawmi2010 Firstly, we are pretty much assuming that the Christian God (at least I am) is the correct deity, not saying it is, just for this argument because the problem isn't whether or not God is the correct deity, but the overall sense of how pragmatic the decision of beliving him is if he was the correct deity but his existence was unknown. This is of course theology rather than a more secular argument, so if that's not your thing, you might as well leave, because we will start to argue different things, and it won't really go anywhere (as a side, I did say at the bottom of my rant that there are better arguments for this, one of which is the one you mention. Anyway, with that out of the way. I am saying that believing is more pragmatic than not believing, so the notion of "that's impossible, you can't be pragmatic and believe in God at the same time" firstly is something I personally don't believe (but we don't care about personal opinions lets be real) and secondly does not fit within the context of this question, the question was whether or not believing was more pragmatic not whether that was possible. The idea that immoral Christians can go to Heaven is most definitely a valid concern. After the Crucifixion, anyone who believes Jesus was the Saviour and all that will be saved no matter what. Also, predestination is a thing as said in Ephesians 1 so if Hitler was predestined for Heaven, then he was predestined for Heaven. Of course, I could bring out the argument that God would never bring such people into Heaven, but that would be hypocritical of me. So I'll say that, banking on God's omnibenevolent and omni knowledgeable nature, that since God is all good and all knowing, he must know what any of us will do in our lives, and will only choose the good ones for Heaven. However, it is a pretty weak argument in my opinion, but it'll do for now. Also, the context of God's choices on who to send to Heaven has nothing to do with Pascal's Wager, so either it's just an aside or it's wrongly put into this argument
1) Assuming the "Christian Deity" is the only possibility just a belief. Also, even for the "Christian Deity" there are different ways of "believing". It could even be applied to every single religion, even Pastafarianism. 2) Even if we had only the dilemma "believing in THE God or not", you are adding a second belief : Heaven is the best option. You can argue all day, but do you have any information about Heaven ? Or Hell ? Hell could be a really nice place, with Lucifer letting you do whatever you want to, whiile in Heaven you have to follow the orders of Michael. Or I could argue that spending an Eternity with a God who REQUIRES belief, even if I was an examplary man during my whole life, isn't great. 3) Even if Heaven was the best place to spend Eternity, you are adding a third belief : God will send the believers in Heaven and the non-believers in Hell. You can say "God's choices on who to send to Heaven has nothing to do with Pascal's Wager", which is just wrong. If God only sends the "good people" to Heaven, even if they don't believe in God, then believing or not doesn't matter. Or anything similar. If we look at it as a game : The third belief is the strongest one. You are giving the general rules of the game. The second belief is just a bit weaker than the third but stronger than the first : you are giving the payoffs of the game. The first one is the weakest claim, you are giving the possible moves. So by creating a game where "believing is God" is the best option, you get the conclusion : believing in God is the best option. Well ..... Any logical argument for believing or not in God has to be flawed. But the pragmatic point of view if probably the worst of all. We don't know the general rules of the game, we don't know anything about the payoffs and we don't know all the available moves. You can believe or not in anything you want to. But you should be aware that believing or not in God is beyond any logical argument. You just cannot define all the posibilities !
glad to see someone else having a problem with the term "pragmatism". but the way that label was applied to pascal (i don't believe he used that label on himself ever) basically was a side-swipe to say "pragmatists don't rely on reason; the ends justifies the means". however, that is quite an oversimplification (a necessary one for the sake of a short video). pretty sure most reasonable pragmatists are quite offended at that implication, and some may even be horrified to just be grouped with the likes of pascal. but in the interests of using simply-defined terms, your reasoned approach may be termed "prudentism" or "prudentialist" instead.
the clock can be set by our hands, so it is impossible not to doubt if the clock's "time" is correct. but we can't deny the "true" presence of time, at least in a pregmatist view.
i fucking knew it was gonna be Pascals wager. lol. we would've been way better off now if Pascal spent the later part of his life contributing to mathematics instead of trying to prove god with an argument he knew was unconvincing
In my childhood/early teens, I pretty much came to the same conclusion as Pascal. Obviously, I wrongly believed that the Quran was infallible and perhaps included some miraculous pieces of text, something I'd only check at the age of 19.
@Raven Every deity/organised religion that we know of was clearly invented by people. So, whatever the nature of reality is, it is highly unlikely that it coincidently involves what these humans have called God and religion. From this, I can safely assume that other similar assertions by ancient humans (unbeknownst to me) about the existence of God(s)/religion is just as trivial as the belief in Zeus, Apollo, the Abrahamic God, Cows, the Sun, etc. My ‘beliefs’ are simply what we know through observation and experiment (i.e. science). This is the way to get closer to the truth.
@Raven God would expect us to have assured faith, right? However, isn't this all circular reasoning? God exists because faith in him is assured, and faith in God is assured because God loves us (i.e. exists), and God exists because faith in him is assured, and faith in God is assured because God loves us (i.e. exists)...
@Raven When I said "God exists", I meant "proof that God exists". I was saying how I don't think the concept of assured faith is any sort of proof/evidence of God's existence due to the circular reasoning fallacy in the argument.
@Raven I see. So faith is assured (i.e. there's proof of God) from the evidence of design in nature. Sorry, but this argument is invalid as the conclusion (there is a designer) is assumed in the premise (nature requires a designer). This logical fallacy is generally known as 'begging the question'. Design must first be demonstrated before a designer can be inferred, and there is no reason to suggest that nature is 'designed'. We actually now understand the way in which many complex systems (e.g. organisms) emerge from unconscious self-organisation (e.g. phase transitions, molecular self-assembly, folding of proteins) to create their apparent order. Our 'watchmaker' is the set of physical laws that govern the universe.
The problem with Pascal's Wager isn't that one god might exist, but there are an infinite amount of possible gods that might exist. God A might give eternal punishmemt and reward God B might not care God C might punish all God D might punish all born on a Sunday I could go on forever. Simple matter. Pascal's wager is impractical because it is a bet on infinity. It isn't even pragmatic.
+Mesoforte Nebulous Well, if you assume there is a god, to parse out which of those attribute of is more likely, the subject of study becomes Theology, and I think we are a few years away from CC Theology
Of course it's pragmatic. Just look at all those Saudi kings with 20-30 wives and 50-140 kids following the Quran exactly which limits wives to 4. Try not using religion to do that! Checkmate athiests!
+Mesoforte Nebulous This is actually a really great point. God A might decide that people who believe in him go to heaven and those who don't go to hell But it's just as likely God B sends people who believe in a God to hell while those who do not go to heaven.
But, the odds of you betting using Pascal's wager aren't 50:50. There are so many religions out there that it is more like 1/1000 to 50. How do you know which belief to bet on?
I'd say an argument against pluralism can be argued mathematically. Let's assume because time is observably infinite, more religions will be invented over time. For the sake of argument, imagine if 1 religion is correct. 1 divided by x as the limit of x goes to infinity = a number so close to zero it might as well be zero. Estimably, if 99.999... are false then the probability of all religions being false is reasonable high. If one religion you picked; however unlikely to be correct is real then you could prove it to be objectively observably realistic. Religion relying on faith based on mental reinforcement than observable evidence isn't realistic based on objective proof.
Soulless Jack Religious pluralism is seen by many religions as heresy, and one who believes in it in these religions could go to hell just as easily as any non believer.
Well, are there really so many viable religions? You would think that if God has an interest in your belief and if he has any control over it, he would be less likely to go through one of the obscure religions. (If God doesn't have control, it wouldn't affect the odds, so the chances still tip in favor of a major religion.) If that's true, you could narrow your choices down to Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism, in that order. (Less likely, but not impossible, would be Sikhism, Judaism, Baha'ism, Confucianism, Jainism, or Shintoism.) Since failure to believe in Hinduism comes with comparatively mild consequences, and Buddhism is an atheistic religion, the most pragmatic choices become Christianity or Islam. Frankly, I think Christianity is the better of the two, but not for pragmatic reasons. This doesn't eliminate the other options; it just makes them less likely, assuming my premise is correct.
As a devout Muslim, I find the concept of Fideism as directly contradictory to my beliefs. Now, If you don't have my beliefs AND wish to merely insult me, just please keep scrolling. As for those who don't, here's why I say this. Fideism is to throw away reason, and the Quran says in verse 8:22 that the worst of living creatures are those without reason.
+comb528491 Huh, I like that line of thought. I always forget (along with every fucking American) that there was rational before there was Radical Islam, and that we have all of pre-renaissance Islam to thank for algebra, medicines and our fucking number system. Also the verse quotation is rendered as a time stamp, but that's kind of inconsequential.
+comb528491 I agree, however in my experiences (limited to christians I'm afraid) people tend to fall back on that because the bible is just a mass of contradictions and antiquated reasoning that contradicts modern science as well as ethics. Really don't know the Quran at all but I assume that there are similar problems there.
Roxanne Hattingh I suggest you read the Quran if you want. Find if there are contradictions yourself? The Quran actually challenges the reader to find contradictions in verse 4:82.
The thing about Pascal's wager is that if it applies then what i call Hitchens wager applies. The premise is if its in your best interests to believe then it is also in your best interests to choose which religion to follow . This would obligate you to study all religion's for fear of retribution that a lot of religions would exact on you .
Quibble: Indiana Jones was represented as saying the first letter in Jehovah was an I not a J since Hebrew had no J, but they also did not use the name Jehovah. Jehovah was a Christian invention derived from YHWH. Minor quibble, yes, but symbolic of how Christians also derived their God model from the Hebrew one, adding features not all directly prompted by the original. This sort of thing is also the biggest problem with Pascal's Wager, as many have commented here. I choose to bet on ever-improving scientific modelling.
But wouldn't an all-knowing god understand that, due to you having limited information, you have to make your decision based on *something*? If such a god has withheld evidence, all that remains is pragmatism - and being offended that you're using what you're left with is rather disingenuous; if god is all-good, could he really be upset that you found your way to him, even if you did it through pragmatism rather than blind faith? To put it another way, what god would give you the tools to think, then be mad that you used them to justify belief in him? Unless this god actually just wants mindless followers acting in blind obedience, in which case I would begin to question his 'all-good-ness'.
But if this all knowing god wants to get you into his fold why limit your access to information about him? Also why extend this disparity so broadly. Being born in different places at different times meant you would believe in totally different gods, likely not this all knowing one. So he kinda shot himself in the foot right? Going by those test parameters I'd be inclined to call him a name I probably should not type in case a child reads this. Zeus didn't pull any of these stunts! And he might be around still. It is only by legal decree and not by actual celestial defeat that a lot of folk in the west worship that one god guy. What if Zeus won and he forgot to tell everyone? Or Odin? Or Baal? What if Marduk awaits? I haven't been offering 200 bulls to them monthly!
the biggest issue with Pascal's wager is that it's a false dichotomy. it says that either god exists or doesn't. but what god? believe in the wrong one and you're going to hell. So it's more like throwing a dart and hoping.
Sure, but as mentioned, if the chance is small, you should take it. Lets say there are 1000 religions out there, so when you pick one, you still have chance, tiny, but still a chance, but if you do not pick any religion, then you have no chance, at all.
Except for the fact that you're leaving out the possibility that the gods that made this planet may have devised this life as a test of strength of mind and those choosing blind faith in a fake god made by humans is just one way to fail the test and be condemned to oblivion. ...Among an infinity of other possibilities. Without knowing, it seems wise to place the chips on what we can directly understand.
The God of the Bible. The Creator of the Universe. Even the Qur'an is speaking of the same God. Buddhism has no god and the polytheists claim no one almighty god. So your faith is either in the perfect, Almighty God or it's not.
@Harry Lagom Paul, an apostle of Jesus, taught: The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:14). You can continue in skepticism all you want, but there is no peace in skepticism. You cannot expect to know many details about God. Imagine you are the author of a book. You create a universe with people in it, but these people are actually alive. Put yourself in the place of these characters. Can you imagine that they could have anymore knowledge about the author than he lets them. That is why we can't expect to know to much about our creator. Nevertheless, it is hard to explain our existence (the origin of life) in any other way. I would invite you to let go of skepticism and "come near to God and he will come near to you" (James 4:8). Having a true and living God in your life is a game changer -- in a good way. Do not resist his grace.
I am reminded of one of the songs Phil Collins wrote for the Disney's Tarzan soundtrack: "Put your faith in what you most believe in." The first time I heard those lyrics, I thought, "Oh, wow, how marvelously circular and unhelpful that notion is. I mean, people already do that. By definition, people trust in whatever they believe in. Thanks for yet more pop songs with empty words, Phil Collins."
Why does Pascal assume that God(s) would be okay with believing in Them only because of self-interest? Or even assume that God wants us to believe in Them? Maybe only athiests go to heaven? It doesn't make any sense, but people always say that 'God works in mysterious ways', and that explanation has certainly justified weirder things. And we don't really have any gauge on how likely any of these scenarios are. But all that is beside the point: if we're willing to abandon reason just because we've decided that it's in our self-interest to abandon it, why are we even bothering with philosophy?
+Joshua Evans-Lowell I make no claim of having studied anywhere near all religions, even superficially (there are over 11500). But from the few I did study, in one fashion or another, most gods don't care about sincerity, as long as you do the mandatory rituals. Not even belief is required in most of them, let alone faith.
God would be okay with the introductory meeting between man and God being based on self-interest, but the relationship is expected to grow more meaningful after this connection, as the video attests.
Kinda sad you didn't point out the biggest flaw in Pascal's argument- namely that there is no reason to assume that the one God that exists is a very specific version o the judeo-christian one. The one true god might be Allah, Brahman or Zeus and each of them is mutually exclusive- meaning they will all punish you with eternal torment for believing in a different god so you're, quite literally, damned if you do and damned if you don't, because the cost of being wrong is actually potentially eternal torment as well. What's worse, there's even no way to determine if god, if it exists, actually rewards belief. The god that exists might reward you with Heaven for something absurd like eating strawberry ice cream on Fridays. Or, worst of all, the god that actually exists might reward disbelief, taking into Heaven only those who explicitly denied it's existence. This is a bet that is simply impossible to take, because you don't really have all the information, you don't know the odds, at all.
+Arrakiz666 I think it doesn't matter if there is one god or a council of gods. You said it, one cannot have all the information, thus, it doesn't matter if you said, I believe in one god (or a creator), and you gave a name to that god even if it is not the real name of it, after all, you don't have all the information, and if the god(s) understand that you don't (and maybe won't) have all the information, then it is okay to believe in one, two, or hundred gods. Assuming that a god will reward you for acknowledgment is equal to saying he/she/it won't reward you. But IF it rewards you, you won the bet, if it doesn't, you didn't lose anything (unless you go to a church or a mosque and waste your time praying meaninglessly).
Sakatoki91 You didn't understand what I said did you? I said it's possible that there is a a god who will punish you for believing in it. So in actuality you can lose everything for believing in it and you have no way of knowing if that's the case or not. You don't know if the god will be merciful and will understand your lack of information, maybe it thinks you have sufficient information to make the decision. Maybe it's simply a cruel god and we all end up in Hell regardless. This is a bet in which it is impossible to tell the odds, believing in any particular deity is just as likely to end you up in Hell as disbelieving in it so the best course of action is to actually withhold belief. This is a fool's gamble. A gamble that only works as a scam. It is not an honest argument and not a gamble anybody should take.
comb528491 And you know that how exactly? That is demonstrably false given how the religions are mutually exclusive and the representatives of each will claim that believing in another god, who they claim to be a different entity, definitely, leads to your damnation. And it is impossible to say that the god that exists won't send you to hell *for believing in it* or even just for kicks. Are you willing to take the risk?
This seems less like the last installment in the Philosophy of Religion than it does the last installment in the Philosophy of Christianity. Given that I suspect that other religions might have interesting ways of looking at things, that's kind of a shame. And it brings up the question - given that Mr. Green is certainly smart enough to understand that Religion ≠ Christianity, why not just call it the Philosophy of Christianity, and make it clear that other religions weren't going to be discussed?
What Brandon said. Maybe he's just being PRAGMATIC (see what I did there?) given that it's hard to deny Christianity likely impacts more viewers, indeed most of the world, than does any other religion.
He may have, Brandon Hall, but it wasn't at the beginning, either of the series as a whole or the start of this set of episodes. But even if he had - that's _not_ a good reason to conflate things that aren't the same. Neither, for that matter, is the idea that Christianity has the most followers, Chris Klaes. Because Christianity didn't develop in a vacuum - it picked up on philosophical ideas from religious beliefs the preceded it and existed along side it. Religion is bigger than just Christianity, and that's worth keeping in mind.
many things are known about the JD God and many philosophers have gave opinions on the JD God not as much is known about many other Gods, and for Hindu Gods as an example, they can be very complex and would take a multiple videos just to explain them
If that's the way you chose to look at it, *****, that's cool. But that still isn't a good reason to conflate Christianity with religion - it's like teaching a class on _World_ History, but limiting it to the nation you live in because it would take too long to explain the rest of the world. Well and good, but that doesn't make the label "World History" accurate. And in this case, I'm not faulting Mr. Green for limiting his discussion to Christian ideas about God - just the fact that he calls that the Philosophy of _Religion_, when then there is more to religion than that.
Pascal's wager would be fine if it weren't for the push to be "more and more religious" that inevitably comes with belief and the radicalization and obvious associated problems that come with it.
+Ben Miles However, many people do become radicals. Radicals, clearly, are the most faithful of them all. Most people aren't as trusting and faithful as them. They have full and utter belief and put their life before it. Few people are like that.
+Turtle Neckson I would argue that radicals are often used for political purposes to justify an end. People that are power hungry will use whatever means necessary to further their agenda, wether it's religion, fear, or moral and intellectual superiority.
+Ben Miles I have met very few people that I would say have an 'extreme belief' in any deity. Plenty of people for whom their gods/goddesses have a central place in life, certainly, but extreme? No. Extreme belief would be more like pre-17th century Europe, where religion was front and center of people's lives. When heresy was frowned upon deeply and was typically removed, by force if necessary, and prior to the Peace of Westphalia, heresy was a valid casus belli. So by their standards, the belief that most people hold today would be found incredibly lackluster and quite noncommittal by the people of the past. Extreme belief is quite relative I'll admit, but that's all the more reason to not assign the majority to having 'extreme' beliefs. After all, are they still extreme if they're held by the majority?
Speaking as a faithful Catholic theist who just finished his masters in Catholic Philosophical Studies, I can tell you that the Church does not take kindly to fideism in religion. One can check the Catechism, Fides et Ratio, and the Anti-Modernist Oath to see this. Faith is the fulfillment of reason through grace and the evidence of reliable historical testimony of the Apostles, martyrs, and miracles concerning God's self-revelation. Plus, an Christian who is not a pelegian can tell you that going through the motions of religion does not a proper and loving relationship with God make.
Fine. However, your position presupposes the existence of God (i.e., postures more along the lines of a theological-confessionalist approach [with an appeal to an alleged authority ] to the matter whose)--an ontological "given," one night say, the veridicality of whose existence is, after all, the very issue at-hand for Pascal's more philosophical (if assuredly flawed) approach on the matter of God's existence. That seems problematic: Save that appeal to your creeds would fail to meet Pascal on his own ground--Pascal's reasoning is not beginning with faith and a theological commitment; rather, it is begins with reason--is their not a measure of irony in the Roman catholic church's disdain for fideism? For example, is it not the case that the finest Roman catholic philosopher of them all, Thomas Aquinas, maintained that the supreme deliverance of reason--viz., no shortage of Aristotle's thought--can--at the very best--establish only that a God exists (an Unmoved Mover, A First Cause), albeit never disclose anything of God's character--the latter being ultimately an apprehension of faith, however mediated? He did; and he denounced his Summa, I seem to recall, as utterly inept at articulating the mystery of God. Well, then, is the the basis for belief in the alleged God--the one whose character is, as its said to be known, neither short on grace nor mercy, for example--ultimately, a matter of faith? It seems that it is. And while such faith hardly denounces reason to fideism's extent, ultimately its own creeds, the language of which is at best remotely analogous to a God whose thoughts and ways are said to be above humans' own, do themselves prove a failure when it comes to articulating a "proper [akward phrasing, I find] and loving relationship with God".
+Manne Segerlund Nihilism is related with existentialism so I would assume so. Nihilism is the most important philosophical problem we have currently so ignoring it would be kind of ludicrous.
regardless of what is truth or not I appreciate the seemingly unbiased approach he took to this, right or wrong you can't form a belief or opinion without knowledge of it, so I truly applaud these videos to get more knowledge out to the masses
When you have a sister like Quinn, life itself seems like a troll, and you lack the heart to visit the same upon anyone. Anyway, to the point: Alison Doody. She's *so* bad in IJATLC that she's a millstone dragging the film down; every scene she's in is excruciating. Karen Allen, on the other hand, in IJATKOTCS, is wonderfully wry & playful.
"If you're giving up or reason and evidence, then all beliefs are philosophically equal."
That's really good.
the other issue with Pascal's Wager is you can apply it to absolutely every religion, even ones you make up your self. A lot of old European thinkers seem to share the problem that they don't seem to realize Christianity isn't synonymous with all faith
+255ad I'd rather believe there's a flying spaghetti monster and be wrong than NOT believe there's a flying spaghetti monster and be wrong.
+255ad He did basically mention it with the tea-potists
+Yassir Douslimi What if there's more than one god, and they find it insulting to assume only one exists?
+Lookoutitsdomke It depends on how tasty he is...
+255ad With the thousands of Gods , Goddesses and deities worshipped throughout human history as well as the infinite number of possible deities hitherto unthought of, Pascal's wager becomes a bet on infinity, where you must throw a dart at one particular God, hope none of the other infinite number of deities exist or care about your beliefs. The bet becomes an impossible wager with no God more likely than the other. The only way to play the bet is to look at the evidence for each outcome and realise that all lack evidence, so it's probably best not to make the wager.
"Send this email to 10 of your best friends or something bad will happen!"
Pascal's Wager in action.
BagheerathePanther the problem with that is that you know there’s a 0% chance that something bad will happen to you. Even if you don’t believe in God or any type of religion I wouldn’t believe anyone who said they never even imagined of some being that at least started everything leaving out wether or not they’re good bad or anything else
Victor Ortiz, Pascal would send the emails, because it would be worse, if a bad thing acually happened.
I'm definitely stealing your analogy. Thanks 😉
this is brilliant.
@@victorortiz8977 For pascals wager to hold you have to not only believe in some being that started everything, but you have to believe in a being who will reward you eternally or punish you eternally based entirely on whether or not you guessed correctly if it exists, without sufficient evidence. THATS more ridiculous, and harder to believe than the idea an email can give you bad luck.
"But Marge, what if we picked the wrong religion? Every time we go to church we're just making God madder and madder."
-Homer Simpson
Recognition of the harmful ignorances of denominations seems to prove God.
Most authentic believers will tell you the worst case for God is Judaism, Catholicism, Muslim, Christian etc etc
@@michaelgrimes5588 I don't see how that proves the existence of God.
@@cassun603 Because, when you take denominational Christianity as flawed, and even downright evil sometimes, you then have to go back to the Word itself. That is what sets a person free. The prophetic word is so precise, that you have to be a complete idiot not to see it. But, it takes time and patience and a lot of work. In the end, the devout student is blessed beyond belief. Think about it, if you were the devil trying to subvert God, you would spend most of your time in churches!
@@kenbellchambers4577 If you take the bible as the word of god, then your very faith is flawed. You cannot cherry pick what parts of "God's word" to believe. You have to either take all of it or none of it. But since the Bible contradicts itself so many times, and if god is perfect, then the Bible can't be God's word.
@@cassun603 The apparent contradictions in the bible are due to first, not reading the whole book, and not reading it with an open mind. Secondly, translational errors. Hebrew is a difficult language and errors happen fairly easily, and thirdly, not seeking advice on apparent contradictions which have been satisfactorily resolved for hundreds of years. I was an atheist. I KNEW I was right. I read the bible with an open mind. I was no longer an atheist. After that, whenever I sought an explanation regarding contradictions, I found answers. The bible is a book so deep, that if you studied it for ever, it would surely still be quite able to surprise and enlighten. Please provide a few of the contradictions that you have encountered, and I may be able to help.
wish he explained the main flaw of Pascal's wager: that it assumes that there is only one religion to choose from
and also in the case of Christianity if you only believe in God because it is the best bet, from a Bible point of view that gives you eternity in hell because you don't believe in God by faith, so that means believing in God's existence without the 'true faith' part is no difference than if you just didn't believe. I think this is also another flaw in Pascal's wager. You can't just use your gambling & math skills to buy your ticket to heaven/eternal life. Faith is integral.
It still applies, better to choose one than none
@@j-dog7767 Only if it's a religion that doesn't stress on faith
@@j-dog7767 not so sure, if you choose the wrong god, he might be more angry at you than he would if you don't worship the competition
Patrick Van Gelder well with the major religions in the world they’re pretty cut and dry. What I mean by that is that the Abrahamic gods don’t have different punishments for those who worship other gods, and those who don’t at all. They all go to hell. Technically in Catholicism there are levels of hell, but honestly they all sound pretty bad, like burning on embers vs torn apart by demons. On the other hand there are some religions where faith isn’t completely necessary, or maybe a god that doesn’t care if we have faith in it, but that brings us back to the wager
Me and the bois brainwashing ourselves into heaven
I am a Christian, and I have to say your videos on religion, almost always, are near flawlessly objective. Being neither swayed nor nuanced one way or the other. Your true scientific observation is impressive. (sincere complement)
Gotta love the "Pascal's mugging" objection.
A man walks up to you in the street and says: "hey, I'm God. Give me all your money as a testament to your faith, and I'll send you to heaven. If not, I'll send you to hell." Do you call his bluff and risk infinite loss, or fork over the cash in exchange for infinite reward?
Lolll Honestly I see your point. Simultaneously though, believing in God also doesnt cost as much as your whole fortune and if you gave up your whole fortune that would go against pragmatic idea.
btw I'm not religious so plz dont get mad at me
@@omowako its not about the amount, this argument works just as well if this self proclaimed street god asks you for 20 bucks
@@alialmans Lmao true though
@Mary Smith I hope this was sarcasm haha XD
@@timothymonaghan8875 ? This is just Pascals Wager which really doesn't matter which God you believe in (even though Pascal was a Christian). The main point is that being an atheist doesn't really benefit you compared to being religious (given that this religion promises a better after life)
Shame that the unit is ending. This has been very interesting.
Sorry, but i'm glad it's over. Spent 4 years listening to this stuff, stopped caring. I can't wait for some existentialism however, i wanna see how crash coarse handles this subject.
It's just the religion part. There's only so many ways you can philosophically dissect the potential existence of a presumably non-provable being.
i was disappointed it was short too
zakk silva-sampaio
Existentialism is probably my favorite part of philosophy. :D
+zakk silva-sampaio um, that's the next video
I heard that Pascal knew his own wager fell short somehow, and that a mathematical reasonable argument wasn't gonna change anyone's heart. That's why he concluded with his most famous quote: "The heart has its reasons that reason knows not".
That's the lovely thing about proper philosophical thinking: You don't even have to make a case for or against something. You can just honestly lay out the arguments, including some of those mentioned in favour of faith, and the unsatisfactory nature of some of those arguments will reveal itself to the observer without the presenter having to make the case himself.
Wish I could like this twice
The Flying Spaghetti Monster's blessings are free to all who search for them. R'Amen.
Pennetastic! xD
Nick J. Lol... bruh...😂😂😂🤣😵
It's true because he boiled for our sins!
Except no one actually believes in it, it's just a middle finger to people who believe in a God.
Nick J. This is HERESY! Only the Saucesiah can save our Saucy souls
This video was filmed in Indiana with Indiana in it.
+Cryp Tic Not quite -- CC Philosophy (along with all other Hank-hosted Crash Course series) is filmed in Missoula, MT.
-Nicole
+Cryp Tic NOOO bad internet! you making brain hut!!
+CrashCourse hey CC was Hank in Cyberchase?
Yo dawg
Damn +Ryan Doty back at it again with the old memes
On pascals wager, Hitchens once said that " I would presume divine sir, that you have some respect for intellectual honesty and for moral courage, and that you would look with favour on somebody who made an honest profession of unbelief then on someone who acceded to believe in you in the hope of a hand out"
life IS a handout. None of us created ourselves.
Christopher Hitchens gave the best arguments against Pascal’s wager. His contributions would have been a welcome addition, but it’s possible the creators didn’t know, I only found his lectures, debates, and videos a few years ago.
Hitchens..that's the best you got ?
I always had a hard time understanding the concept of a God who is benevolent, wise, and all-knowing and yet not all-empathizing. God, if you do exist, I'm living in the world you created, in the circumstances you put me in, with the body and brain and soul you granted to me. If my life didn't turn out as you would have liked, that's on you, buddy. And if, given my circumstances, I decided not to believe in God at all or to believe in some other god while also being a good person who treats others well, then that ought to be adequate to please you. And yet, supposedly, the Christian God's top concern is whether you believe in Him specifically and not other gods. It's truly bizarre.
@Andy Holland Amen
One issue with Pascal's wager, is what if the God you're believing in is the "wrong god", and the real god will send you to their hell because of your worship of false gods/prophets...
+Knowka I think you would most likely have the best possible chance of going to a better place (assuming there is one) by being a murderous glory-seeking warrior. That would secure a good place in two or three religions... Most others would only net you one spot on the table of religions...
+Knowka If you follow that line or reasoning you have to go with the religion that has the highest rewards and the worst punishments. Allso it should be compatible with as many of those religions that do not require you to believe into them, just to live the way they think is right.
I came to the comments to ask the same thing.
The Mormon/LDS Church believes in "degrees of glory" in the afterlife. The lowest tier for non believers still actually glory and better than earth life. The only place lower, Outer Darkness, is the worst of sinners -- those that deny God's existence (such as the soul of Lucifer himself)
True it does not account for paganism
+Knowka You're presuming that there must be one true religion for God, but that is not necessarily true. You can believe in a sort of God and not believe in any religion, say, all religions are man-made and are not from God, and if you can do that, the problem you're presenting will not be an issue in Pascal's Wager.
I've just been converted from a jedi to a teapotist
So, Pascal was a "practical coward?" Btw, I'm loving this. You tackled philosophy and religion like a badass. I have No complaints. Thank you all for these videos! 📚❤
Yes existentialism is coming up, one of the most important philosophies of the twentieth century. I really hope he covers French existentialists like Sartre and Camus.
Sartre is awesome.
+Andre Lee camus isnt an exsistentialist
+Andre Lee He will definitely cover both of them eventually, although Camus is an Absurdist, which, believe it or not, is actually not Existentialism (I think).
+Andre Lee I don't see why he wouldn't.
+ayernee +SergeantRobbinBobbin
Camus did not like labels and he did reject titles like "existentialist" and "absurdist". However, many, including me, consider him an "existentialist" because of his ideas were heavily influenced by Kierkegaard and his friends Sartre and Merleau-Ponty. Camus partially differed from his contemporaries in his views of the mankind, the world and life's joys, which got him labeled an "absurdist" but he still remains an integral figure in the history of existentialism which formed much of the basis for his own philosophies expressed in L'Etranger and Le Mythe de Sisyphe.
Your lectures have caused me to study philosophy as an interest. It has made me look at things in a different way questioning every bit of detail I see. Thanks for existing
This channel is the most unbiased form of educational medium I've probably ever seen
Indy's "leap of faith" makes for great movie stuff because the film was only 2D, however since Indy has 2 eyes, and parallax means that he'd have been able to see the "invisible bridge" as it was at a vastly different depth from his eyes than the rest of the pit... It was still a good optical trick, but one that wouldn't work IRL.
Not that scene. It was fairly well lit so you could see the chasm. Even if it wasn't, the light from whatever source he'd be carrying would illuminate the bridge brighter than the opposite wall of the chasm.
That's one of the scenes where I lost my suspension of disbelief. Even if Indy had only one good eye, simply moving his head in any direction would induce parallax. The next ten minutes of the movie I missed because I kept wondering how he could _not_ see the damn bridge.
The bridge was approached from one particular direction. What if the bridge was just wide enough to not be seen while approaching from that direction because of how it was painted, while after you take the first step it immediately became visible? Yeah it's not what's shown in the movie, but couldn't one alter the set to make it possible? I mean, if you can't move and the bridge is wider than the tunnel you come from, the paint can be disguised to include features to fool parallax.
You can't paint something to fool your perception of depth so that it appears to be farther away AND perfectly match the background on the other side.
If you watch the movie again, you'll see that Indy is moving around, but the camera is in a fixed position. That's because the illusion will only work for the camera if it's in that exact spot. Once it moved, the illusion was broken.
Nice cinematography, but wouldn't work IRL.
He should have just thrown sand onto the bridge before he crossed it, not after.
I take offense at the remark about the spaghetti monster, I am a proud pastafarian!
+Jeremy R Step aside, us pagans are superior. Thor for LIFE.
+aj mckinney Accept his noodly magnificence into your heart, into your soul, and ye shall forever be free. R'amen
+Jeremy R Don't be too proud of this Theological terror you've constructed! It's abilty to gain followers is insignificant, next to the power of The Force! :D
+Jeremy R Pastafarianism: "cleanliness is the furthest thing from godliness".
I take offense to your taking offense
You skipped the biggest criticism of Pascal's Wager: what if you're believing in the wrong deity? Darkmatter2525 explained it well; an atheist hears Pascal's Wager and converts to Christianity, then he dies and finds out he angered Allah and goes to hell.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but are not they the same God? Both religions descend directly from, and share their central deity with, Judaism, as the God in the old testament is the same as the God in the new testament and in the Qur'an, no? The God of all three religions is the God of Abraham, who is one of the foremost ancestors of Jesus and who is the father of Ishmael, a central figure in the ancestry of Islam.
Yes they are. The difference is that what God did after the Old Testament. Both of them were rooted from Torah. All of them are the same in the Torah but parted ways in the New Testament and Qur'an. Let us assume that the Old Testament was true. Sooo, it's either 3 of these possibilities are true.
Admittedly true, I was splitting hairs. But then, comes another interesting question - is agnosticism "better" than faith in the wrong deity? Is faith in the wrong God better or worse than faith in no particular God at all?
Neither, I can only suggest you one thing: Live your life to the fullest and don't let these holy books tell you what to do. There are 3 million deities and only one of them can be true. If God exists then most likely you're going to hell as the chances are less than one percent.
Point made, but Allah and God are the same deity, so...
I'm a religious person for 18 years since I was born. Being freed from religion was the most liberating thing that happened to me. All thanks to crash course philosophy and all the debates about religion that I watched on youtube. It really taught me how to think rather than what to think.
as a recovering religious zealot some odd 20 years ago, I understand this completely and while I have no beef with religion, I have a beef with hierarchical structure/designs, people who sit at the top of the pyramid and are considered infallible and speak for god/gov't/whatever it may be. Also you are 100% correct in that I hate that most people don't learn to think for themselves, I'd rather see someone think for themselves and be wrong than not to think at all. At least some are trying to break from from the world's cultural indoctrination.
Congrats 😁🎉👏
Watching philosophy videos and taking my two semester philosophy class has been made grateful to really know more about the Lord. Still, the most important thing is having a relationship with God, and not being stuck on religious rules and what other religious people tell you what to think. I do not know if you stopped believing in God along with freeing yourself from what others tell you to think. If so, I'm not going to lie, that does make me sad, but at the same time there is so much false doctrine we hear that people are quick to follow just because they are told what to think instead of how God wants us to think and see the world. I hope you do get close to God if you are not, and that it will bring you freedom and peace as it is doing for me, but that you will never be chained by false religious rules, false pro-God rules, false anti-God rules, and false traditions ever again!
I'm pretty disappointed you didn't mention any of the major problems with Pascal's Wager.
His wager assumes only one religion - likely Christianity - and disregards all of the thousands of others we've created.
If you don't believe in Islam, for example, regardless of if you believe in god, you still go to hell. Since there are so many religions, all or most of which promising endless post-mortem torture to any who don't follow or believe in their tenets, then by sheer probability, we can *all* expect to have an unpleasant afterlife if even one of those religions is true, and there's no way to tell which one it might be. They can't all be right, but they *can* all be wrong.
Also, considering many of those gods are jealous, the atheists are better off. Wouldn't a jealous god be more forgiving if you lacked belief in any gods than if you actively blasphemed and worshipped a false god your whole life? Yeah.
Ultimately, it goes back to what Marcus Aurelius (might have) said:
"Live a good life. If there are Gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are Gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no Gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones."
It's not THE major problem, just a major problem. I can think of a few more. xD
Which are?
Except that many religious people believe that none of us live an adequately just life on our own, so that plan won't work either. You have to see yourself as being awesome in order to get to that view, which is a sin of pride in itself. The reason that Christians believe Jesus was necessary is because living a "good life" that is up to God's standards is virtually impossible.
You didn't listen close enough... Pascal in essence said even if there is the tiniest .000000000000000000000001% chance that you could be believing in the correct god it is still better to take that minuscule chance than not to. So even if you pick the wrong god, from his point of view your still better off than not picking a god.
Larry Bobinski Good point. I vaguely thought about that but for some reason that didn't register to me as a strong objection until you mentioned it.
My only issue with this video is not naming it "Indiana Jones and the Wager of Pascal"
Also: Pascal's Wager is a false dichotomy. There are not only two possible options.
Well, if the question is "do u believe in god?" It sure sounds like a yes or no answer
+you bin But what god? There are thousands of religions..
even if you said "i dont know" it would be considered as a "no"
+you bin But we're not talking about the question, it's about the wager. Pascal sets up a false dichotomy that either there is a God who values belief in him or there doesn't exist one. But these aren't the only two options, in fact there are infinitely many options, you are only constrained by your imagination. One thinker has put forth the idea of a god that rewards atheism but punishes belief. You can think of a god that doesn't care if you don't believe, but if you are a theist who doesn't believe in him in just the way he wants, he will punish you. Again, the possibilities are infinite.
+iwannacomein umm....belief actually *is* a dichotomy. Either you believe or you do not.
"You might miss out on coveting stuff"
Yeah, … coveting and sex … and thinking that you are worth something as you are … quite a lot actually (in some religion at least) :)
Pascal's wager pretty much applies to every religion or belief, so according to Pascal your best bet is to believe in every religion that exists or has existed, even if they contradict each other...
more accurately, you believe in the religion with the highest pay off In respect to the others. If there's a relatively neutral end proposed for non believers in a religion (such as Judaism) then you can "ignore" that religion safely. Pascal never addresses anything beyond Christianity/monotheism because the idea of multiple gods us philosophically untenable to him. So your choices are basically the "big" three: (little) Judaism has no penalty for morally acting non believers, Islam is relatively benign as well. Only Christianity promises eternal hell for failure to believe (dudes, what's up with that?) so Christianity is the only proposition he works with on his wager.
but the FSM, at least the versions that contains onions in their salsa, sends you to hell if you follow any religion or believe in a god, even in him. So if he exists, the best bet is to not believe in any god.
With Wildhide
??? read the bible and see what happened to the people that believed in Ba'al... is worse to believe in a different god than to not believe in any god at all.
if i'm not mistaken, pascal was basically okay with anyone with a decent faith, whether it was christianity or not. basically, you convert if you found out that some other faith had a greater chance of god-accuracy, but otherwise, your guess is as good as his. this is pragmatism without requirement, so only the ends really mattered.
So even though we doubt it and we still fake it as we believed it just in case we got punishment? After all, if god really exists will he or she knows that we are faking ? XD ok i am just messing up with what i just learnt
pascals waiger also assumes that there is just one religion in existence
Which makes it kinda appropriate for this Crash Course, eh? ;)
You can apply it to many religions as well. If there are 1000000000000... religions, believing in one of them is a better bet than not believing in any of them. If you don't believe there is 100% chance of punishment or nothing happening. If you believe in one, there is still a minuscule chance of being correct and getting rewarded.
+Bernie Patt
This is only true for religions which have as a part of their dogma the concept of imminent damnation without salvation through faith in the religion's dogma. That's actually a ridiculously tiny portion of religions - Christianity, Islam, and the few religions that have branched off from those.
For the vast majority of religions in human history (many of which still exist) the entire notion of salvation is an alien concept. You might be better off wagering on Shintoism, Hinduism, Wicca, or most forms of Buddhism if they're right, but there is minimal consequence to betting against them even if they are right. People seem to forget that the threat of damnation was a recruiting tool Christians used to convert people from all over the world from their original religions, and *that would only work if the original religion didn't also damn you for abandoning it*.
This is why I'm so disappointed Crash Course never delved into the philosophy of other religions. The atheist/Christian split in western discourse is so dominant that westerners tend to not even be aware anymore how much their arguments revolve around Christianity to the exclusion of basically everyone else in the world (with the sometimes exception of Islam).
+Bernie Patt This is a statistics fail. The majority of humans on earth believe in the God of Abraham (Christian, Jew, Muslim). There are fewer than 10 major religions that account for the gods people generally believe in currently. Not 10000000000000 gods.
or you could follow the wager a different way and follow the golden rule that seems to connect all major religions.
Don't be a dickbag.
Join the Church of The Flying Spaghetti Monster today
+JesusFriedChrist Ramen.
Clap
Clap
Clap
+Jack Means As a mighty pirate, I find your proselytizing to be highly offensive.
Heathens! It is the undeniable truth that all shall bow down to the all-powerful Cthulhu!
+Chester Snapdragon McPhisticuff Cthulhu!!
I love how this doesn't particularly sway your opinion he gives both sides and allows you to decide for yourself.
Pascal's wager is a false dichotomy, there isn't only one religion.
+Nordic Ducks don't be daft, he's obviously just talking about belief in Ahura Mazda. Read your damn Avesta, it's all in the good book.
Why do people think this works? If you believe in another religion, you do not believe in God. It's a simple yes or no question.
However, all religions do seem to worship the same entity, and I'm not talking about the Abrahamic ones. Even polytheistic religions such as Hinduism believe all of their deities combine to form a superdeity. Other polytheistic religions seem to upgrade worshippers of said deity into deity-like status. In the end, all religions worship the same God.
I mean, the God of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism is the same God.
+Nicole Feltman Which God?
My favorite part of this video is the clever placement of the Deep Thoughts By Jack Handy book as a desk prop!!
As a Christian, I really enjoyed watching this series!
It (re)affirmed some of my beliefs, and made me wonder (not so much question) some other aspects of my beliefs, and religion in general. I think the writing is really good and Hank is just wonderful in presenting it :)
Thanks ChrashCourse team! :)
Agreed! I think every Christian should evaluate their faith, reasoning, and beliefs. To avoid a focus on 'religion' and to seek a more meaningful basis than simply a means of self-identification or worse, tradition. I'm a Bible-believing disciple of Christ. And for this video, I agree Pascal's Wager is not the best reason to become a Christian. But in playing the odds, I prefer a teleological stance: we are here and the statistics are way too much in favor of a Creator. No matter how it was done, it had to have been done with a guiding force, because the chances of abstract development of the cosmos are too great.
@@jp4jc well, the teleological argument doesn't get you to Christianity.
Im a Christian and I enjoyed this segment very much. You did a good job trying to stay unbiased, Thank you for that Hank. Check out William Lane Craig for more Christian philosophy.
Indy’s leap of faith is one of my most favorite scenes! You kind of left out Indiana’s schooling by his father, which is to say, he was well versed in the mythology of Christianity.
An enjoyable review overall.
But what if there's a god that will torture you if you believe in a god?
Since that's just as plausible (same amount of evidence, after all) as a god that will torture you if you don't believe in them, then pascal's wager cancels itself out.
(Edit: Alternatively, a god that tortures you if you believe in *any* god)
For every theoretical god with a certain will (it wants you to believe in it) there is a theoretical god with an opposite will (it doesn't want you to believe in it, or any others). *So Pascal's wager always cancels itself out.*
EDIT(x2): This argument is expanding Pascal's wager for *any* god. There's way more problems when one only applies it to the Christian god, like Pascal originally intended. (Thanks +Chris Seals)
So basically, I'm just stripping Pascal's wager down to the risk/reward argument. (Thanks +N. Wasinger)
and of course: what if one of the other religions (alive or dead) are/were correct?
You just blew my mind.
Logan White Then good for the people that believed that? I mean, if you want to pick a random religion to believe in because you have a feeling it's correct then knock yourself out. I'm just saying that pascal's wager is self-contradictory and not practically useful. I'm not asserting which religion is real.
That's actually not plausible, because you are postulating that a god exists, therefore it is only logical to believe in such a god (one that exists). Such a god would be unjust in punishing you for using logical deduction to come to the conclusion that it exists, because you are created with the ability to deduce truth for the sake of your existence (a trait given to you by a creator god in your scenario). You win your day in court, or such a god would be a Lord of Chaos, and it really wouldn't matter what you believe. Pascal's Wager stands.
To be clear: I mentioned that as a problem with Pascal's Wager. He was only thinking of his god. I don't see any evidence for any god so I'm atheist. :)
And yes, most postulated gods are dicks ahah
man I'm loving this series, such an interesting yet well layed out format plus hanks humid takes the seriousness off the topics so it seems less like forced school and more like learning out if interest
"Today we conclude our unit on Philosophy of Religion"
Thank the gods.
Thanks folks. Here all week. Tips accepted.
lol wut
@@emmawrites4533 The name of our lord and saviour shall be written "Dzeus" you heretic!
"I have faith in the things I have faith in"- Hank Green
This course was absolutely amazing !! I've always wanted to read about philosophy but found it hard to understand yet this course made it much easier. .. Make some more philosophy courses pleeease
Pragmatism: when philosophers give up on trying to prove gods existence
You said about Pascal's Wager, but about David Mitchell's view on this? He said "What if there is an afterlife but you only go to it if you are an atheist?"
This guy gets it!
That kind of goes against most of the atheists view on the world. If there was an afterlife for atheists, who or what put them there? What happened to the theists? If there was a someone or something, is this place Hell for not believing in them? A big problem to that is where do theists go and why would the atheists have afterlife when most atheist don't believe in one.
the ultimate amazing irony
Teanu Tamayo I don't have to have a ready answer for it. I'm doubtful any kind of afterlife exists, let alone any specific details. If we are totally honest then we admit that the prospect of an afterlife is so alien that if it were to be possible then anything would be possible. But as a pure hypothetical then life could be some kind of test to make sure that people don't delude themselves, so perhaps to join the afterlife society you need to prove that you aren't gullible enough to believe in god without evidence. If you fail the test then perhaps they kill you or cast you out or something equally hellish. Again it doesn't have to be realistic because there is no example of a logical afterlife given by theists either. There is no issues whatsoever with the assumption that there can exist an afterlife which favors atheists if afterlives can exist at all.
@@Neutomy it'd be like a reward mechanism for critical thinking and rationality..
Matrix operators testing if we realize it's a matrix or not..
And theists will be dismantles by the space overlords
Of all the arguments in the philosophy of religion, I think Pascal’s is the most convincing
I did a project on Blaise Pascal for my Catholic Studies (CST) and I used this video to help me. Thank you!
Please do more on the philosophy of religion! Super interesting stuff and love how u present everything in an objective non-biased way
It is, in fact, entirely possible, that there might now be a teapot orbiting between Earth and Mars -- in a Tesla Roadster. 😎😎
Starman needs some hot tea to keep him warm in outer space, you know how cold it gets there!
Here's my two cents: Any God who will put me in hell for not worshipping them does not deserve my worship.
Sounds like last weeks episode :P
I agree.
then you implicitly choose hell...that's not as useful as you thought huh?
God won't destroy you in hell for not worshipping Him, He'll destroy you in hell because you refuse to let go of evil when He finally destroys it from the universe forever so that everyone can live with fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore, with no more pain or death.
+jim gordon *Shrug* I can deal with that. I'd rather go to hell than abandon my ideals. 'Sides, a lot of my friends are either atheists or LGBT+ and I'd be happier spending eternity with them in without them in heaven.
The problem with Pascal's wager is that it makes it seem like the choice is between believing in one particular god or Atheism. However there are many different gods/goddesses/deities that people have worshiped for centuries and you might end up believing in the wrong one. If all your basing your belief in is Pascal's wager you're taking just as big a gamble as the nonbeliever.
+Brandon Hall Indeed the greatest problem of Pascal's Wager is that it limits the space of possibles to a universe with only one possible divinity. The wager becomes moot if the possibility of choosing one among many possible monotheistic divinities. And if one must consider a polytheistic supernatural cosmos, the logic matrix cannot even be constructed.
unless of course there is one god among the many that apparently makes you a better person or a particular religion that makes you happier
I don't believe in religion, but I'm still skeptical of multiple religions being a counter argument.
If I have a 0.000000001% of going to heaven between religions or 0% with atheism, the smallest percentage is a reasonable risk.
+Luna Malie Your counter argument is flawed too. What if God decides to reward atheist with heaven, or rational thinkining people? Or for the sake of argument, people who like their stake medium rare? We don't and can't know what the entry conditions would be for a random God, not just each believe but each and any action might be a deal breaker for him.
+Jeremiah B hmm, when you say "you believe", you are implying that you have faith that there is this god you described. you have no evidence. you just believe there is, which is how faith can be descibed. you seemed to have sentenced yourself to eternal damnation with your not so well thought out comment. but I imagine you take this approach with the rest of your life. so it should not be much of a surprise to you. hopefully your brain is still developing and you still have plenty of time to work out a coherent philosophy on life. good luck with that by the way...
I loved this series, thank you!! Great info, animation and narration :)
This makes me wonder:
Should I be pondering the existence of God when I have history homework to do?
unicomisMEI Yes
I hope you watched the episode with existentialism.
If you want to really understand history, read the entire kjv with an open mind. This will also open the road to understanding virtually all literature better, as the bible appears everywhere in classical works. It also opens many other doors to better understanding of our times. This is urgent. So, yes, pondering the existence of God should be at the very top of your list, permanently. [Do not expect to understand it, because you won't, don't skip lists of names, pay attention and try to pronounce them, Later you will be greatly rewarded for your patience.]
hey, the comments look good so far, no militant atheists claiming their belief is superior to Christians and no Christians telling people they are going to hell. woot woot. :D
Just wait...
+justin bouche You're goin to hell
👌👌👌👌👊👊👌👌👌👌
+justin bouche militant atheists, I think you are going to far. Militan christians try to denie people rights, militant muslims explode, militant budists shank people etc. Since when is commenting on the internet on a video about religion and reasons of believe something militant?
+watbenikgoed Because it can severely hurt feelings of others
First video of the series a have a mid-sized criticism for: talking about Pascal's Wager without mentioning the false dichotomy of either god or no god vs. the multitude of mutually exclusive religions is a major oversight.
In the end, all religions worship the same God. And I'm pretty sure All religions worship a God who loves an individual who searches for him.
+comb528491 This is empirically false. Many religions do not require the belief in any gods such as Buddhism. Others require belief in multiple gods such as Paganism. Also, people are not religions. An individual theist can have many theological differences with other theists.
KimBouncesFish I apologize for making it unclear. What I meant was that polytheistic religions such as Hinduism seem to believe that their Gods combine to form some superdeity. Other religions seem to upgrade worshipers of the deity to deity-like status. My guess is that all religions started out the same, but simply evolved.
But it was mentioned. It's the last point he makes in the video.
***** Ah, an interesting point. I was referring to the Hindus. I see the reverse as happening. They first worshiped a monotheistic deity, and then started ascribing different personalities, started dividing this entity up to fit their worldview, and then started promoting Human worshipers of this deity to Godlike Status (Kinda how the Christians do with Jesus), and then, finally, went down to spirits after everything got weird.
I love how this is PBS, 'cause this is really a public service.
I'm actually watching this at 11:30... talk about scary when he mentions the exact time you're at
The odds of watching it at 11: 30 are 1: 1440 because there are 60 minutes in an hour and 24 hours in a day. (not taking into account that 11: 30 occurs twice in a day). With over 23,000 views, it is bound to happen to some people. I was watching this at 11: 20 so I was pretty close too. But it is a fun coincidence when these things happen to you.
I think you made a very clear case that this kind belief, especially using pascal's argument, requires a step away from reason.
Pascal's Wager is not the sum of religious faith; it is a thought experiment. It is a merging of faith and logic.
Faith and logic are about as miscible as water and oil
Pascal, a mathematician and scientist of the highest historical order, was not strong in logical discourse?
***** Forsooth! Great point comrade :) We now know that alchemy is bunkum [it has been totally replaced by chemistry done using the scientific method] but it was studied and practiced by Newton. Also, when he came to the limit of his understanding regarding the motion of the planets and the equations were not sufficient to describe the observed phenomena he then decided that the remainder must be the work of God. But, using Einsteins relativity we can now do those calculations on the remainder. It just goes to show that even the greatest of intellects is not immune to fallacious reasoning
+Pandemic Eloi.7 Don't be silly. You have to reach level 9000 naivety to think Pascal's wager has anything to offer. For starters, it begs the question: by presupposing the existence of heaven and hell. If they don't exist [and I don't know why any intelligent, freethinking, and not brainwashed adult would believe they do...] then Pascal's wager is meaningless.
The teapot: "SHOW ME WHAT YOU GOT!!!!!!"
I kinda love that one of the foremost guys in probability theory devised an argument for belief in a god rooted in bets and wagers. It just fits together so nicely.
You missed another large flaw in Pascal's Wager. The idea that believing in God gets you a ticket to Heaven is an assumption: a HUGE assumption. Believing in the Christian God could easily get you sent to Hell by Allah if Islam turns out to be correct. Perhaps Allah would be less angry at people that don't believe in him than those who actively worshipped a false god. Pascal's Wager equally supports all religions. Most religions punish you for believing in a different religion, and picking a religion at random is unlikely to get you the correct one, so perhaps remaining neutral is the best strategy. And really, since we know nothing about God, there could just be a God that only rewards atheists, because he finds rationality to be a virtue, rather than faith. A terrible argument all around, especially since I don't think I could ever force myself to believe anything; I'd feel dirty and wrong even trying.
Well, based off just the Christian interpretation, Hell is equal to everyone: the worst pain forever, so there probably isnt a tier system where atheists go to the 6th tier and false believers go to the first tier or something. However, if there are those kinds of religion (which is probably true considering the chances) then i see your argument panning out. It's a very rational way of thinking.
Exactly, and then Pascal's wager doesn't work. Pascal's wager needs 3 "beliefs", and these 3 beliefs are equivalent to "God exists".
Jeremiah B From Islam.org (not some source trying to attack Islam), a Jahil-e-Muqassir is a non-believer who is aware of Islam, and is thus damned to Hell. Source: www.al-islam.org/faith-and-reason-ayatullah-mahdi-hadavi-tehrani/question-13-non-muslims-and-hell. I'm sure there are some Muslims who think decent atheists can make it into Heaven. I'm also sure that this is not the traditional belief.
Jeremiah B “This Book is not to be doubted…. As for the unbelievers, it is the same whether or not you forewarn them; they will not have faith. God has set a seal upon their hearts and ears; their sight is dimmed and grievous punishment awaits them.” Quran 2:1/2:6-2:10
“God’s curse be upon the infidels! Evil is that for which they have bartered away their souls. To deny God’s own revelation, grudging that He should reveal His bounty to whom He chooses from among His servants! They have incurred God’s most inexorable wrath. An ignominious punishment awaits the unbelievers.” Quran 2:89-2:90
As well as thousands of other religions some of which believe in a hell.
what about the part where Indiana threw dirt on the last test?
He was looking for evidence of the existence of a way to cross.
He threw the dirt on after he crossed as evidence to others. In analogy, Indy traversed a gap in knowledge blindly, but discovering it's true nature, he left behind evidence as proof so that those that came after need not be blind with ignorance...
I have to disagree with both philosophies. I'm not gambling away my life, HOPING it works out. I'd rather work with what I know and learn and move forward from there. I'd argue THAT is pragmatism.
Well from the perspective of finite happiness vs infinite happiness, believing is the better option. Of course one would argue that the finite happiness might as well be infinite from a mortal's perspective if God doesn't exist, that's where the gamble comes in, either eternal happiness or less happiness (i say less happy rather than suffering because if you really believed, you'd probably be pretty happy with your life in most cases) than non-believers (unless you just find the greatest joy in believing in some religion, in which case, go for it bro) or the other side of coin is "eternal" (for mortals) happiness or eternal damnation. The positive outcomes and negative outcomes favor believing in god, but that's my personal take on this. There are other arguments against Pascal's Wager that are pretty good that i recommend checking out
+you bin the simplest rebuttal to pascal wager is that it assumes God's characteristics. God is equally likely to reward atheists and burn theists as he is to do it the other way around. Each possible scenario eventually averages out to a "not much" scenario.
TheTsugnawmi2010 Firstly, we are pretty much assuming that the Christian God (at least I am) is the correct deity, not saying it is, just for this argument because the problem isn't whether or not God is the correct deity, but the overall sense of how pragmatic the decision of beliving him is if he was the correct deity but his existence was unknown. This is of course theology rather than a more secular argument, so if that's not your thing, you might as well leave, because we will start to argue different things, and it won't really go anywhere (as a side, I did say at the bottom of my rant that there are better arguments for this, one of which is the one you mention.
Anyway, with that out of the way. I am saying that believing is more pragmatic than not believing, so the notion of "that's impossible, you can't be pragmatic and believe in God at the same time" firstly is something I personally don't believe (but we don't care about personal opinions lets be real) and secondly does not fit within the context of this question, the question was whether or not believing was more pragmatic not whether that was possible.
The idea that immoral Christians can go to Heaven is most definitely a valid concern. After the Crucifixion, anyone who believes Jesus was the Saviour and all that will be saved no matter what. Also, predestination is a thing as said in Ephesians 1 so if Hitler was predestined for Heaven, then he was predestined for Heaven. Of course, I could bring out the argument that God would never bring such people into Heaven, but that would be hypocritical of me. So I'll say that, banking on God's omnibenevolent and omni knowledgeable nature, that since God is all good and all knowing, he must know what any of us will do in our lives, and will only choose the good ones for Heaven. However, it is a pretty weak argument in my opinion, but it'll do for now. Also, the context of God's choices on who to send to Heaven has nothing to do with Pascal's Wager, so either it's just an aside or it's wrongly put into this argument
1) Assuming the "Christian Deity" is the only possibility just a belief. Also, even for the "Christian Deity" there are different ways of "believing". It could even be applied to every single religion, even Pastafarianism.
2) Even if we had only the dilemma "believing in THE God or not", you are adding a second belief : Heaven is the best option. You can argue all day, but do you have any information about Heaven ? Or Hell ? Hell could be a really nice place, with Lucifer letting you do whatever you want to, whiile in Heaven you have to follow the orders of Michael. Or I could argue that spending an Eternity with a God who REQUIRES belief, even if I was an examplary man during my whole life, isn't great.
3) Even if Heaven was the best place to spend Eternity, you are adding a third belief : God will send the believers in Heaven and the non-believers in Hell. You can say "God's choices on who to send to Heaven has nothing to do with Pascal's Wager", which is just wrong. If God only sends the "good people" to Heaven, even if they don't believe in God, then believing or not doesn't matter. Or anything similar.
If we look at it as a game :
The third belief is the strongest one. You are giving the general rules of the game.
The second belief is just a bit weaker than the third but stronger than the first : you are giving the payoffs of the game.
The first one is the weakest claim, you are giving the possible moves.
So by creating a game where "believing is God" is the best option, you get the conclusion : believing in God is the best option. Well .....
Any logical argument for believing or not in God has to be flawed. But the pragmatic point of view if probably the worst of all. We don't know the general rules of the game, we don't know anything about the payoffs and we don't know all the available moves.
You can believe or not in anything you want to. But you should be aware that believing or not in God is beyond any logical argument. You just cannot define all the posibilities !
glad to see someone else having a problem with the term "pragmatism". but the way that label was applied to pascal (i don't believe he used that label on himself ever) basically was a side-swipe to say "pragmatists don't rely on reason; the ends justifies the means". however, that is quite an oversimplification (a necessary one for the sake of a short video).
pretty sure most reasonable pragmatists are quite offended at that implication, and some may even be horrified to just be grouped with the likes of pascal.
but in the interests of using simply-defined terms, your reasoned approach may be termed "prudentism" or "prudentialist" instead.
Just finished the unit from beggining. Outstanding introduction to the topic
I worship Arceus, Dialga and Palkia. The true origin of life is Mew.
"Whether it's 11:30 and 11:40"
*looks up*
*clock says **11:40*
Hol up
the clock can be set by our hands, so it is impossible not to doubt if the clock's "time" is correct. but we can't deny the "true" presence of time, at least in a pregmatist view.
Owen Xu Wtf
@@khynki6548 because it is more convenient to just accept and use time than deny it. but just don't trust clocks
XP
@@PewPewBadaBoom What are you talking about, the guy was joking
@@khynki6548 *just another kind of philosophical joke
Pascal was found dead in a pool of his own blood with a razor laying next to his corpse with the name "Occam" engraved on the blade.
Please cover Augustine’s philosophy on faith and reason
i fucking knew it was gonna be Pascals wager. lol. we would've been way better off now if Pascal spent the later part of his life contributing to mathematics instead of trying to prove god with an argument he knew was unconvincing
He didn't try to prove God existence, you miss the whole point
Well, you're right. He tried to argue for the belief in the existence of God. But he was still aware it was unconvincing
Being unconvinced is the whole point
In my childhood/early teens, I pretty much came to the same conclusion as Pascal. Obviously, I wrongly believed that the Quran was infallible and perhaps included some miraculous pieces of text, something I'd only check at the age of 19.
@Raven Hi. I don't believe in any organised religion as there's no evidence for any of them, and evidence against much of them.
@Raven Every deity/organised religion that we know of was clearly invented by people. So, whatever the nature of reality is, it is highly unlikely that it coincidently involves what these humans have called God and religion. From this, I can safely assume that other similar assertions by ancient humans (unbeknownst to me) about the existence of God(s)/religion is just as trivial as the belief in Zeus, Apollo, the Abrahamic God, Cows, the Sun, etc.
My ‘beliefs’ are simply what we know through observation and experiment (i.e. science). This is the way to get closer to the truth.
@Raven God would expect us to have assured faith, right? However, isn't this all circular reasoning?
God exists because faith in him is assured, and faith in God is assured because God loves us (i.e. exists), and God exists because faith in him is assured, and faith in God is assured because God loves us (i.e. exists)...
@Raven When I said "God exists", I meant "proof that God exists". I was saying how I don't think the concept of assured faith is any sort of proof/evidence of God's existence due to the circular reasoning fallacy in the argument.
@Raven I see. So faith is assured (i.e. there's proof of God) from the evidence of design in nature. Sorry, but this argument is invalid as the conclusion (there is a designer) is assumed in the premise (nature requires a designer). This logical fallacy is generally known as 'begging the question'. Design must first be demonstrated before a designer can be inferred, and there is no reason to suggest that nature is 'designed'. We actually now understand the way in which many complex systems (e.g. organisms) emerge from unconscious self-organisation (e.g. phase transitions, molecular self-assembly, folding of proteins) to create their apparent order. Our 'watchmaker' is the set of physical laws that govern the universe.
The problem with Pascal's Wager isn't that one god might exist, but there are an infinite amount of possible gods that might exist.
God A might give eternal punishmemt and reward
God B might not care
God C might punish all
God D might punish all born on a Sunday
I could go on forever.
Simple matter. Pascal's wager is impractical because it is a bet on infinity. It isn't even pragmatic.
God C548 condemns all who worship with a crooked finger
God Q987 only raises into paradise those who have webbed fingers
+Mesoforte Nebulous Well, if you assume there is a god, to parse out which of those attribute of is more likely, the subject of study becomes Theology, and I think we are a few years away from CC Theology
+Mesoforte Nebulous
God 42 only atheists get to go to heaven.
Of course it's pragmatic.
Just look at all those Saudi kings with 20-30 wives and 50-140 kids following the Quran exactly which limits wives to 4.
Try not using religion to do that!
Checkmate athiests!
+Mesoforte Nebulous This is actually a really great point.
God A might decide that people who believe in him go to heaven and those who don't go to hell
But it's just as likely God B sends people who believe in a God to hell while those who do not go to heaven.
Christopher hitchens called Pascal’s wager, “Religious hucksterism”. I could not agree more.
But, the odds of you betting using Pascal's wager aren't 50:50. There are so many religions out there that it is more like 1/1000 to 50. How do you know which belief to bet on?
Religious pluralism?
I'd say an argument against pluralism can be argued mathematically. Let's assume because time is observably infinite, more religions will be invented over time. For the sake of argument, imagine if 1 religion is correct. 1 divided by x as the limit of x goes to infinity = a number so close to zero it might as well be zero. Estimably, if 99.999... are false then the probability of all religions being false is reasonable high. If one religion you picked; however unlikely to be correct is real then you could prove it to be objectively observably realistic. Religion relying on faith based on mental reinforcement than observable evidence isn't realistic based on objective proof.
Soulless Jack Religious pluralism is seen by many religions as heresy, and one who believes in it in these religions could go to hell just as easily as any non believer.
I am religious and can confirm this statement. I think hinduism and buddhism are cool with that but I honestly haven't looked into it.
Well, are there really so many viable religions? You would think that if God has an interest in your belief and if he has any control over it, he would be less likely to go through one of the obscure religions. (If God doesn't have control, it wouldn't affect the odds, so the chances still tip in favor of a major religion.) If that's true, you could narrow your choices down to Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism, in that order. (Less likely, but not impossible, would be Sikhism, Judaism, Baha'ism, Confucianism, Jainism, or Shintoism.) Since failure to believe in Hinduism comes with comparatively mild consequences, and Buddhism is an atheistic religion, the most pragmatic choices become Christianity or Islam. Frankly, I think Christianity is the better of the two, but not for pragmatic reasons.
This doesn't eliminate the other options; it just makes them less likely, assuming my premise is correct.
As a devout Muslim, I find the concept of Fideism as directly contradictory to my beliefs. Now, If you don't have my beliefs AND wish to merely insult me, just please keep scrolling. As for those who don't, here's why I say this. Fideism is to throw away reason, and the Quran says in verse 8:22 that the worst of living creatures are those without reason.
+comb528491 Huh, I like that line of thought. I always forget (along with every fucking American) that there was rational before there was Radical Islam, and that we have all of pre-renaissance Islam to thank for algebra, medicines and our fucking number system. Also the verse quotation is rendered as a time stamp, but that's kind of inconsequential.
+comb528491 I agree, however in my experiences (limited to christians I'm afraid) people tend to fall back on that because the bible is just a mass of contradictions and antiquated reasoning that contradicts modern science as well as ethics. Really don't know the Quran at all but I assume that there are similar problems there.
Thank you for speaking your mind
Charnel I was merely giving my religious opinion on Fideism.
Roxanne Hattingh I suggest you read the Quran if you want. Find if there are contradictions yourself? The Quran actually challenges the reader to find contradictions in verse 4:82.
You should do a Crash Course Theology and then only talk about philosophy
Start with video one - you will understand what Philosophy is and then you may understand a bit better.
The thing about Pascal's wager is that if it applies then what i call Hitchens wager applies.
The premise is if its in your best interests to believe then it is also in your best interests to choose which religion to follow . This would obligate you to study all religion's for fear of retribution that a lot of religions would exact on you .
These were very informative and helpful, thank you.
Quibble: Indiana Jones was represented as saying the first letter in Jehovah was an I not a J since Hebrew had no J, but they also did not use the name Jehovah. Jehovah was a Christian invention derived from YHWH. Minor quibble, yes, but symbolic of how Christians also derived their God model from the Hebrew one, adding features not all directly prompted by the original.
This sort of thing is also the biggest problem with Pascal's Wager, as many have commented here.
I choose to bet on ever-improving scientific modelling.
A fool and his money are soon parted
Also an all knowing god would know if your faking it or not.
True.
And an all-good one would be rather offended by such a mercenary bet.
But wouldn't an all-knowing god understand that, due to you having limited information, you have to make your decision based on *something*? If such a god has withheld evidence, all that remains is pragmatism - and being offended that you're using what you're left with is rather disingenuous; if god is all-good, could he really be upset that you found your way to him, even if you did it through pragmatism rather than blind faith?
To put it another way, what god would give you the tools to think, then be mad that you used them to justify belief in him?
Unless this god actually just wants mindless followers acting in blind obedience, in which case I would begin to question his 'all-good-ness'.
HeavyMetalMouse PREACH!
But if this all knowing god wants to get you into his fold why limit your access to information about him? Also why extend this disparity so broadly. Being born in different places at different times meant you would believe in totally different gods, likely not this all knowing one. So he kinda shot himself in the foot right? Going by those test parameters I'd be inclined to call him a name I probably should not type in case a child reads this. Zeus didn't pull any of these stunts! And he might be around still. It is only by legal decree and not by actual celestial defeat that a lot of folk in the west worship that one god guy. What if Zeus won and he forgot to tell everyone? Or Odin? Or Baal? What if Marduk awaits? I haven't been offering 200 bulls to them monthly!
I just love learning about philosophy. hearing both side of the argument teaches you so much..
Great series! Thank you for sharing!
"Never give a sucker an even break" - W.C. Fields
'Get away boy, you bother me!' W.C.Fields
the biggest issue with Pascal's wager is that it's a false dichotomy. it says that either god exists or doesn't. but what god? believe in the wrong one and you're going to hell. So it's more like throwing a dart and hoping.
Sure, but as mentioned, if the chance is small, you should take it.
Lets say there are 1000 religions out there, so when you pick one, you still have chance, tiny, but still a chance, but if you do not pick any religion, then you have no chance, at all.
Except for the fact that you're leaving out the possibility that the gods that made this planet may have devised this life as a test of strength of mind and those choosing blind faith in a fake god made by humans is just one way to fail the test and be condemned to oblivion.
...Among an infinity of other possibilities.
Without knowing, it seems wise to place the chips on what we can directly understand.
The God of the Bible. The Creator of the Universe. Even the Qur'an is speaking of the same God. Buddhism has no god and the polytheists claim no one almighty god. So your faith is either in the perfect, Almighty God or it's not.
@Harry Lagom Paul, an apostle of Jesus, taught: The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:14).
You can continue in skepticism all you want, but there is no peace in skepticism. You cannot expect to know many details about God. Imagine you are the author of a book. You create a universe with people in it, but these people are actually alive. Put yourself in the place of these characters. Can you imagine that they could have anymore knowledge about the author than he lets them. That is why we can't expect to know to much about our creator. Nevertheless, it is hard to explain our existence (the origin of life) in any other way.
I would invite you to let go of skepticism and "come near to God and he will come near to you" (James 4:8). Having a true and living God in your life is a game changer -- in a good way. Do not resist his grace.
@Harry Lagom you have a lot of knowledge. I respect that. All I say is, don't let that get the in the way of a relationship you could have with God.
I am reminded of one of the songs Phil Collins wrote for the Disney's Tarzan soundtrack:
"Put your faith in what you most believe in."
The first time I heard those lyrics, I thought,
"Oh, wow, how marvelously circular and unhelpful that notion is. I mean, people already do that. By definition, people trust in whatever they believe in. Thanks for yet more pop songs with empty words, Phil Collins."
That spinach looks suspiciously like weed.
+Kris Hermstad *claps 420 times
+Aaron Samuel if your pot makes you feel stronger then I think it's laced with something
I take it you're a potist then ;p
God is a teapot, short and stout.
where is the next episode ?
I just by chance stumbled onto this series, however I love it. It takes me back to Sophie's World.
Why does Pascal assume that God(s) would be okay with believing in Them only because of self-interest? Or even assume that God wants us to believe in Them? Maybe only athiests go to heaven? It doesn't make any sense, but people always say that 'God works in mysterious ways', and that explanation has certainly justified weirder things. And we don't really have any gauge on how likely any of these scenarios are.
But all that is beside the point: if we're willing to abandon reason just because we've decided that it's in our self-interest to abandon it, why are we even bothering with philosophy?
+Joshua Evans-Lowell Or what if believing in the wrong God is worse than believing in no God?
+Joshua Evans-Lowell I make no claim of having studied anywhere near all religions, even superficially (there are over 11500). But from the few I did study, in one fashion or another, most gods don't care about sincerity, as long as you do the mandatory rituals. Not even belief is required in most of them, let alone faith.
God would be okay with the introductory meeting between man and God being based on self-interest, but the relationship is expected to grow more meaningful after this connection, as the video attests.
Why even bother living
+QED Stay tuned for the existentialist. You may like them. (You maybe sarcastic in your statement, but I wanted to respond despite that.)
Kinda sad you didn't point out the biggest flaw in Pascal's argument- namely that there is no reason to assume that the one God that exists is a very specific version o the judeo-christian one. The one true god might be Allah, Brahman or Zeus and each of them is mutually exclusive- meaning they will all punish you with eternal torment for believing in a different god so you're, quite literally, damned if you do and damned if you don't, because the cost of being wrong is actually potentially eternal torment as well. What's worse, there's even no way to determine if god, if it exists, actually rewards belief. The god that exists might reward you with Heaven for something absurd like eating strawberry ice cream on Fridays. Or, worst of all, the god that actually exists might reward disbelief, taking into Heaven only those who explicitly denied it's existence. This is a bet that is simply impossible to take, because you don't really have all the information, you don't know the odds, at all.
+Arrakiz666
A strange game. The only way to win is not to play.
+Arrakiz666 I think it doesn't matter if there is one god or a council of gods. You said it, one cannot have all the information, thus, it doesn't matter if you said, I believe in one god (or a creator), and you gave a name to that god even if it is not the real name of it, after all, you don't have all the information, and if the god(s) understand that you don't (and maybe won't) have all the information, then it is okay to believe in one, two, or hundred gods. Assuming that a god will reward you for acknowledgment is equal to saying he/she/it won't reward you. But IF it rewards you, you won the bet, if it doesn't, you didn't lose anything (unless you go to a church or a mosque and waste your time praying meaninglessly).
Sakatoki91 You didn't understand what I said did you? I said it's possible that there is a a god who will punish you for believing in it. So in actuality you can lose everything for believing in it and you have no way of knowing if that's the case or not. You don't know if the god will be merciful and will understand your lack of information, maybe it thinks you have sufficient information to make the decision. Maybe it's simply a cruel god and we all end up in Hell regardless. This is a bet in which it is impossible to tell the odds, believing in any particular deity is just as likely to end you up in Hell as disbelieving in it so the best course of action is to actually withhold belief. This is a fool's gamble. A gamble that only works as a scam. It is not an honest argument and not a gamble anybody should take.
Well, Allah is the Judeo-Christian God translated into Arabic. But even then, I'm pretty sure that all religions worship the same God, in the end.
comb528491 And you know that how exactly? That is demonstrably false given how the religions are mutually exclusive and the representatives of each will claim that believing in another god, who they claim to be a different entity, definitely, leads to your damnation. And it is impossible to say that the god that exists won't send you to hell *for believing in it* or even just for kicks. Are you willing to take the risk?
If you do the math honestly, the only advantage to belief is how believers treat non believers
Honestly, you guys do such a great job with this. So great in fact, that you've compelled me to comment! Please keep up the great work!
Which God?
This seems less like the last installment in the Philosophy of Religion than it does the last installment in the Philosophy of Christianity. Given that I suspect that other religions might have interesting ways of looking at things, that's kind of a shame. And it brings up the question - given that Mr. Green is certainly smart enough to understand that Religion ≠ Christianity, why not just call it the Philosophy of Christianity, and make it clear that other religions weren't going to be discussed?
I think he said at the beginning of the series that the focus would be on the Judaeo-Christian god.
What Brandon said. Maybe he's just being PRAGMATIC (see what I did there?) given that it's hard to deny Christianity likely impacts more viewers, indeed most of the world, than does any other religion.
He may have, Brandon Hall, but it wasn't at the beginning, either of the series as a whole or the start of this set of episodes. But even if he had - that's _not_ a good reason to conflate things that aren't the same. Neither, for that matter, is the idea that Christianity has the most followers, Chris Klaes. Because Christianity didn't develop in a vacuum - it picked up on philosophical ideas from religious beliefs the preceded it and existed along side it. Religion is bigger than just Christianity, and that's worth keeping in mind.
many things are known about the JD God and many philosophers have gave opinions on the JD God
not as much is known about many other Gods, and for Hindu Gods as an example, they can be very complex and would take a multiple videos just to explain them
If that's the way you chose to look at it, *****, that's cool. But that still isn't a good reason to conflate Christianity with religion - it's like teaching a class on _World_ History, but limiting it to the nation you live in because it would take too long to explain the rest of the world. Well and good, but that doesn't make the label "World History" accurate.
And in this case, I'm not faulting Mr. Green for limiting his discussion to Christian ideas about God - just the fact that he calls that the Philosophy of _Religion_, when then there is more to religion than that.
I can't wait for that existential dread to consume me again
Took me decades to find this crash course but I'm so grateful I did. Now I have more questions than answers.
Pascal's wager would be fine if it weren't for the push to be "more and more religious" that inevitably comes with belief and the radicalization and obvious associated problems that come with it.
+Morec0 Literally billions of people have an extreme belief in God and their religion and don't become radicals.
+Ben Miles However, many people do become radicals. Radicals, clearly, are the most faithful of them all. Most people aren't as trusting and faithful as them. They have full and utter belief and put their life before it. Few people are like that.
+Turtle Neckson I would argue that radicals are often used for political purposes to justify an end. People that are power hungry will use whatever means necessary to further their agenda, wether it's religion, fear, or moral and intellectual superiority.
Matthew Askins A much better criticism.
+Ben Miles I have met very few people that I would say have an 'extreme belief' in any deity. Plenty of people for whom their gods/goddesses have a central place in life, certainly, but extreme? No.
Extreme belief would be more like pre-17th century Europe, where religion was front and center of people's lives. When heresy was frowned upon deeply and was typically removed, by force if necessary, and prior to the Peace of Westphalia, heresy was a valid casus belli.
So by their standards, the belief that most people hold today would be found incredibly lackluster and quite noncommittal by the people of the past. Extreme belief is quite relative I'll admit, but that's all the more reason to not assign the majority to having 'extreme' beliefs. After all, are they still extreme if they're held by the majority?
Speaking as a faithful Catholic theist who just finished his masters in Catholic Philosophical Studies, I can tell you that the Church does not take kindly to fideism in religion. One can check the Catechism, Fides et Ratio, and the Anti-Modernist Oath to see this. Faith is the fulfillment of reason through grace and the evidence of reliable historical testimony of the Apostles, martyrs, and miracles concerning God's self-revelation. Plus, an Christian who is not a pelegian can tell you that going through the motions of religion does not a proper and loving relationship with God make.
Amen
Fine. However, your position presupposes the existence of God (i.e., postures more along the lines of a theological-confessionalist approach [with an appeal to an alleged authority ] to the matter whose)--an ontological "given," one night say, the veridicality of whose existence is, after all, the very issue at-hand for Pascal's more philosophical (if assuredly flawed) approach on the matter of God's existence. That seems problematic: Save that appeal to your creeds would fail to meet Pascal on his own ground--Pascal's reasoning is not beginning with faith and a theological commitment; rather, it is begins with reason--is their not a measure of irony in the Roman catholic church's disdain for fideism? For example, is it not the case that the finest Roman catholic philosopher of them all, Thomas Aquinas, maintained that the supreme deliverance of reason--viz., no shortage of Aristotle's thought--can--at the very best--establish only that a God exists (an Unmoved Mover, A First Cause), albeit never disclose anything of God's character--the latter being ultimately an apprehension of faith, however mediated? He did; and he denounced his Summa, I seem to recall, as utterly inept at articulating the mystery of God. Well, then, is the the basis for belief in the alleged God--the one whose character is, as its said to be known, neither short on grace nor mercy, for example--ultimately, a matter of faith? It seems that it is. And while such faith hardly denounces reason to fideism's extent, ultimately its own creeds, the language of which is at best remotely analogous to a God whose thoughts and ways are said to be above humans' own, do themselves prove a failure when it comes to articulating a "proper [akward phrasing, I find] and loving relationship with God".
"No duh"---brilliant.
Wow what a waste of time and effort!
Are you going to talk about nihilism?
+Manne Segerlund no one cares about that
+Hamstray It's fun though
+Kevin O'Neal kinda missed the point. Nobody cares about nihilism because they're nihilists
This argument is meaningless.
+Manne Segerlund Nihilism is related with existentialism so I would assume so. Nihilism is the most important philosophical problem we have currently so ignoring it would be kind of ludicrous.
regardless of what is truth or not I appreciate the seemingly unbiased approach he took to this, right or wrong you can't form a belief or opinion without knowledge of it, so I truly applaud these videos to get more knowledge out to the masses
OK. I'm gonna take Pascal's wager in a reckless fashion.
Crystal Skull is better than Last Crusade.
That's right. I went there!
How do I down-vote?! :/
+Kieren Moore like that
I think they're not on a computer. Phones don't allow downvotes
I think you're trolling, Daria...
When you have a sister like Quinn, life itself seems like a troll, and you lack the heart to visit the same upon anyone.
Anyway, to the point: Alison Doody.
She's *so* bad in IJATLC that she's a millstone dragging the film down; every scene she's in is excruciating. Karen Allen, on the other hand, in IJATKOTCS, is wonderfully wry & playful.