Pascal's Wager 2.0

An interesting article by Gary Gutting in the New York Times on his updated version of Pascal's Wager. I'll try to summarize it later.

From the article: "religious activities such as meditation and charitable works"

Screw him.

"it may make more sense to seek only the “worldly” satisfactions that are more certain, even if less profound."

Yes, let's dress up helping your fellow man as "worldly" and "less profound"... but I sorry, he's not interested in acknowledging the possibility of being good without God.

All in all, less convincing then Pascal's Wager 1.0.

>2 prosfilaes:

The paragraph is:

But perhaps a “serious involvement” with religion will require giving up other humanly fulfilling activities to make room for religious thought and action. Given a low likelihood of attaining a “higher form of happiness, it may make more sense to seek only the “worldly” satisfactions that are more certain, even if less profound. But we can decide for ourselves how much worldly satisfaction is worth giving up for the sake of possible greater spiritual happiness. And, it may well turn out that religious activities such as meditation and charitable works have their own significant measure of worldly satisfaction. Given all this, what basis is there for refusing the wager?

I can see where you're going wrong, but you're simply misreading the argument. I would ask you to read it again, following the argument rather than jumping at phrases.

The argument does not imply that atheists reject either meditation or charitable works. It merely says that one argument against his case is that practices like meditation and charitable giving are onerous. If being an interested agnostic required giving up significant pleasures, it would upset the scales of the wager. His argument is that, if we don't like this stuff, we don't need to do it, and that it may be fulfilling anyway.

You fail to see the argument, and that none of this has any logical implications whatsoever about atheists who like to help people. That isn't mentioned because that's not a potential argument against engaging in agnosticism. In other words, if that floats your boat, great, but it has no bearing on the reasonableness of the wager.

>3 timspalding: However you cut it, it's connecting meditation and charitable works to religion, as if the primary objection of agnostics to religion is meditation and charitable works. Wouldn't it be more honest to discuss the objections agnostics have to fanaticism and religious violence?

It's an argument. You can either follow it and have substantive disagreements with it or avoid comment. Not understanding an argument, and getting mad at your misunderstanding, is not much use.

Tim #5

But meditation and charity do not belong to the religious. So the argument has a major fallacy at it's heart. No god is needed for either of these actions to have meaning or to even exist. Just like Pascal 1.0 starts with a major fallacy as well.

>6 inkdrinker:

Again, you're not understanding.

Let me state this part of argument in the simplest form.

CONCLUSION OF ARGUMENT
All things being equal being open to religion is better than not being open to religion.

OBJECTION #1
Some people might say that all things aren't equal, because they think doing the stuff religions tell you to do is a major pain in the ass.

REPLY TO OBJECTION #1
a. You decide what stuff you want to do.
b. You might enjoy the stuff.

There is no implication that the stuff is ONLY done by religious people. It's not an argument for agnosticism, it's a reply to a potential argument against agnosticism. If your argument against agnosticism is based on the onerousness of the stuff religions require you to do, there's a decent reply. If you aren't making that argument and like to do that stuff on your own, great, you don't have the objection and you don't need the reply.

I have to say, if you don't get this, you aren't processing and participating in the argument. You're jumping at phrases.

#7

The problem with the argument is that it presupposes that there is a divine to be open to and that being charitable and meditating are part of the divine. All of this is based on a fallacy from the perspective of the agnostic or atheist.

I have no problem with:

1. We are religious and we meditate and we are charitable.
2. We find these actions to have meaning and to bring us fulfillment.
3. You should try them. They might do the same for you.

As soon as you attach divinity to either, you're off the rails.

The best argument that I can find for avoiding Pascal's wager is that you might pick the wrong god. There are plenty of gods out there who are into smiting in a big way and most of them are jealous gods for whom worshipping false gods is a major peccadillo so the wrong choice is likely to lead to worse eternal torments than no choice at all.

If god is a decent sort, aware of the frailty of her creation, she'll probably be reasonably tolerant of someone who has mostly tried to get on with his fellow man but never got his head round faith. If not, I suppose it's the red-hot irons ;-(

#7

Actually, there's another problem with the argument at hand. It's the idea that a religious person would think that meditation and charity lead to religion/divinity. Tim, I get that the original argument isn't saying that charity and meditation are divine in and of themselves... but if the author isn't saying they are religious or divine, then why assume that they would lead one to a god or that there is something special about these acts in any way.

(I believe there is something special about both these acts, but that their importance sits firmly in the natural world and can be explained through science.)

The problem with the argument is that it presupposes that there is a divine to be open to and that being charitable and meditating are part of the divine. All of this is based on a fallacy from the perspective of the agnostic or atheist.

No, it doesn't. You're not following an argument. It's as simple as that.

Actually Tim I beg to differ. You're not following the argument. The author of the argument states himself:

"The argument begins by noting that we could be much happier by making appropriate contact with such a power. The next question is whether there are paths we can take that have some prospect of achieving this contact."

"Religious agnosticism may accept the ethical value of a religious way of living and even endorse religious ideas as a viable basis for understanding various aspects of human existence. But the ethical value is a matter of my own judgment, independent of religious authority. And the understanding may be only a partial illumination that does not establish the ultimate truth of the ideas that provide it'

The author does presuppose that there is divinity in religion. He just assumes that it is unnecessary for the agnostic to see the divinity to gain value from religion. He assumes that one is better off leading a religious life than not. He is not seeing charity or meditation as not religious, but rather is saying that practicing these things while doubting is better than not.

"the ultimate truth of the ideas"

Is a way of saying that just doing them isn't quite the same as doing them and believing they are divinely sanctioned.

I believe that many of the teachings of Christ are excellent ways to live one's life. I do not believe that he was divine/the son of god or that there is anything special about his teachings beyond being good ways to treat each other and one's self. I'm living my life in a very Christian way in many aspects, but I am not a part of this author's ideal agnostics. I believe it is highly unlikely there is a divine being and that if there is that he/she/it has no interest in us. (unless we are some kind of very large lab experiment.)

I said I'd try to summarize the argument. Here's my attempt.

Thare are two type of people

A: those who do not believe in a God.
B: those who do believe in a God.

The argument is address to those only in category A.

People in category A are further split into two

A1: those who deny the existance of Gods, and those who doubt the existance of God but are indifferent to possibility that there is something beyond the natural world.

A2: those who doubt the existance of God, but hope that, however unlikely that it might be, "they might find a higher meaning and value to their existence by making contact with a beneficent power beyond the natural world."

The argument is that, given a choice (if that's possible), you should choose to be in category A2 rather than A1.

The reason given is that "we could be much happier by making appropriate contact with such a power."

The second part of the argument is that people in category A2 should seek "paths that might lead to that contact".

The reason given is that others have taken those paths and claim to have made contact with a higher power.

A potential objection is that there may be negative effects to taking the necessary paths. One might be "intellectual dishonesty", which doesn't apply as one is not making a commitment to believe in the higher power, just to make the journey. A second negative effect might be that there are better things on which spend one's limited resources, to which the reply is "but we can decide for ourselves how much worldly satisfaction is worth giving up for the sake of possible greater spiritual happiness."

It's your choice. "It merely calls us to follow a path that has some chance of leading us to an immensely important truth."

-It's your choice. "It merely calls us to follow a path that has some chance of leading us to an immensely important truth."-

Again, one major fallacy is that this argument assumes that this "immensely important truth" is only available through religion and spirituality... and if one concedes this point before beginning this, then one is not likely an atheist or an agnostic of any kind. So, there's not much point in the idea.

>7 timspalding: CONCLUSION OF ARGUMENT
All things being equal being open to religion is better than not being open to religion.

This assumes that "being open to religion" is in itself a state of "openness." Of "more." But you can turn that around and just as easily and posit that by being open to religion you are in fact closing the door on other possibilities of being. Being open to religion is a choice. A choice once made, means there are other things not chosen. So there is no real call to assume that choosing religion would be better. It would only be better if you could convince yourself it was the right choice.

>18 southernbooklady:

Can you spell that out for me? What goods are you foreclosing if you are open to religion?

Are you speaking about something like the psychological value of foreclosing silly possibilities and facing the truth, or what?

Again, one major fallacy is that this argument assumes that this "immensely important truth" is only available through religion and spirituality

The immensely important truth of the existence of God is indeed only available through religion and spirituality, broadly defined. It may not exist at all. There may be other immensely important truths. (Surely there are.) But you seem to believe one can get pizza without being open to pizza.

Two caveats:

1. As a theist, of course, I think you may well get bonked on the head by God, whether or not you're open to him. Obviously, if there's no God, he's not bonking anyone.
2. A position of "closedness" is at least a position. Indeed, in my experience, being a convinced, insistent, determined atheist is statistically more correlated to eventually becoming a believer than being basically uninterested in the question.

>7 timspalding: Some people might say that all things aren't equal, because they think doing the stuff religions tell you to do is a major pain in the ass.

Which is a strawman argument when it comes to meditation and charitable works. What examples you choose do matter for your argument.

There is no implication that the stuff is ONLY done by religious people.

If you remove that implication, then it's really a pathetic argument. It only works as an argument if you presume that a significant number of disbelievers object to meditation and charitable works.

Let's go to real reasons why agnostics might not want to join a religious community: They promote arbitrary rules that hurt or even kill people. They promote tribalism that frequently turns into excusing bad, sometimes even monstrous, acts of people in their tribe, or even committing bad, even monstrous, acts as a tribe. They spend huge amounts of time and energy converting people to their beliefs. They're not really friendly to nonbelievers in their midsts; maybe it's a bit of tribalism of our own showing through, but should we join a religion if it's going to further isolate our fellow nonbelievers who choose not to?

But, no, let's worry about agnostics who might not like charitable works.

Which is a strawman argument when it comes to meditation and charitable works. What examples you choose do matter for your argument.

Right. The objection is a bad one. So you agree with the author. Glad we cleared that up.

>19 timspalding: Can you spell that out for me? What goods are you foreclosing if you are open to religion? Are you speaking about something like the psychological value of foreclosing silly possibilities and facing the truth, or what?

You once asked this of me in another thread and I said that while it would be nice to pretend to live in a world where you believed everyone is nice to puppies, there is more ultimate satisfaction in facing reality, even if it means you have to save a lot of puppies from harm. (We might substitute "school children" for puppies today, given the news of yet another school shooting)

Of course, it is hardly fair to call the proposition that god exists and god is good "silly," (I certainly wouldn't) but the point still applies. Reality trumps fantasy. If you don't believe in god, then adopting the fantasy as a way of keeping your options open is pointless. A distraction. A pretense. If you think -- are convinced -- that "nature is the ultimate authority" (I'm citing Feynman there, I think) then it is useless and perhaps even counter productive to pretend otherwise. Instead, one could turn the wager around and say to the believer "is it not better to keep your eyes focused on this realm, regardless of what you believe of the next? In this realm we know there is suffering to be alleviated. In this realm we can help." What Joseph Campbell calls "joyful participation in the sorrows of the world."

As for what is "open" and what is "closed" -- I think the religious believer regards the nonbelief as a "closed" position because it is not open to their idea of truth. But once again, the reverse would also be valid -- that the religious believer, by deciding they know what is true, has closed the door on other possibilities. This plays out in small silly ways like creationists refusing to accept evolution, but also in more encompassing ways, such as a conviction that without a belief in the absolute good, there can be no such thing as a moral act.

>17 inkdrinker:

this argument assumes that this "immensely important truth" is only available through religion and spirituality

Well sure. It doesn't rule out, however, that other "immensely important truths" are available to you through other paths.

>22 southernbooklady:

If you think -- are convinced -- that "nature is the ultimate authority", then it is useless and perhaps even counter productive to pretend otherwise.

I think the argument relies on the existence of some level of doubt. If you are convinced, the argument is clearly not going to work for you. The only course then is to question your certainty and ask if it is well grounded. Isn't doubt usually a central characteristic of someone who doesn't believe in God but does believes in science?

Reality trumps fantasy.

Only if you are certain you can tell one from the other.

>22 southernbooklady:

If you don't believe in god, then adopting the fantasy as a way of keeping your options open is pointless. A distraction. A pretense. If you think -- are convinced -- that "nature is the ultimate authority" (I'm citing Feynman there, I think) then it is useless and perhaps even counter productive to pretend otherwise.

I can't see this says anything about pretending or feigning. You seem to have added that notion, entirely inappropriately. But I agree with you otherwise. If you are truly, reasonably and completely convinced of something, there's little to be gained in forcing a false openness on yourself. I just don't think many fall into that--either believers or non-believers. If, however, you choose atheist, or theism, from a vantage point of less-than-perfect surety, there's good reason to be open rather than prematurely closed.

If you think -- are convinced -- that "nature is the ultimate authority" (I'm citing Feynman there, I think) then it is useless and perhaps even counter productive to pretend otherwise

Well, I think it's productive for you to imagine that morality can be both real and grounded in materialism. It makes you a better person. So I guess I'm grateful you haven't done the math all the way out on your belief here. Perhaps the same could be said by you for some of my beliefs.

In my experience, a certain willingness to refuse to take all our beliefs to their logical limit is characteristic of decent people, and a willingness to make everything fit their beliefs all the way leads to unpleasant, close-minded people, if not extremism and horrors.

As for what is "open" and what is "closed"

This might be an argument for believers to be open to non-belief. I'd support that.(1)

also in more encompassing ways, such as a conviction that without a belief in the absolute good, there can be no such thing as a moral act

FWIW, I never say that. What people do is disconnected from their belief, deeply. As for the philosophy, I don't think God is required at all. But non-materialism is required for normativity.

I think the argument relies on the existence of some level of doubt. If you are convinced, the argument is clearly not going to work for you. The only course then is to question your certainty and ask if it is well grounded. Isn't doubt usually a central characteristic of someone who doesn't believe in God but does believes in science?

Right.

Only if you are certain you can tell one from the other.

Right. I guess I favor doubt in all things. While I don't want anyone to be false to themselves, I think some of us would be better off dialing back our ontological certainties. Human beings such as myself have been wrong enough on things we're certain about that, well, maybe a soupçon of doubt should be our default position.

---

1. See Pope Francis on religious people having doubt:

If a person says that he met God with total certainty and is not touched by a margin of uncertainty, then this is not good. For me, this is an important key. If one has the answers to all the questions—that is the proof that God is not with him. It means that he is a false prophet using religion for himself. The great leaders of the people of God, like Moses, have always left room for doubt. You must leave room for the Lord, not for our certainties; we must be humble. Uncertainty is in every true discernment that is open to finding confirmation in spiritual consolation.

Does that doubt extend to God himself? I'd say yes. Does it have implications for atheists too? Is there something wrong with being absolutely certain about the non-existence of God—saying not that you've met God, but that you know nobody ever has or will? Yeah, I think so. We're fragile, stupid creatures, trapped in our cultures and times, beset by our problems and obsessions, preprogrammed by evolution toward numerous serious cognitive errors, our beliefs far less often a product of higher logic than simple happenstance, the best of us believing a thousand wrong things about ourselves and the universe. That's just how it is, God or not, and I think it has consequences.

>25 timspalding: If you are truly, reasonably and completely convinced of something, there's little to be gained in forcing a false openness on yourself. I just don't think many fall into that--either believers or non-believers. If, however, you choose atheist, or theism, from a vantage point of less-than-perfect surety, there's good reason to be open rather than prematurely closed.

Well I suppose here we are back to unicorns and Russell's teapot. I would say that a willingness to be "open" (and I question whether this is the equivalent of "doubt") does not preclude one's reason. So I am reasonably convinced that there is no such thing as a unicorn, despite all the existing evidence for it (to whit, some rather gorgeous medieval tapestries). I could be convinced that unicorns exist but that would require evidence I found convincing: Fossils, documentary photographs, running into a herd of them in some out of the way valley. Independent corroboration by several disinterested and trust worthy parties, yada.

Likewise, I am reasonably convinced that there is no such thing as god, but I could be convinced otherwise, if presented with the right evidence. The trick here is in what, exactly, I would find convincing evidence. Since believers tend to insist that the experience of God is a highly personal one, I suppose I'd need some kind of talking burning bush to convince me, because other peoples' personal experience of god is entirely inaccessible to me and thus not sufficient evidence. I've always kind of admired Thomas for demanding he be able to verify the holes in the hands of the resurrected Christ. But I'm aware that I'm in the somewhat useless position of insisting I need evidence and yet rejecting all such evidence offered. I have my reasons, but still -- that sort of thing accounts for much of the friction between the believer and the nonbeliever.

And there is another aspect to questions of doubt and conviction that I associate with religious belief and find problematic: commitment. A person's faith is a serious thing. It's so serious that we don't consider it unreasonable to allow people to opt out of otherwise legal civic duties on the strength of it. It's a measure of how important we rate the conscience, I suppose. But it takes on an extra gravitas when it's manifest in a group of people -- Christians being allow to worship according to their lights, Jewish people being allowed to follow their religious traditions. (An atheist pacifist, by contrast doesn't have nearly the same moral weight in our culture although they should).

So I guess what it really comes down to for me is a constant awareness that I can't adopt that kind of deep commitment to a faith. I am constantly aware that I could be wrong about everything. "Error" -- a willingness to be wrong -- is not something that lives comfortably in many religions. And while I concur with Francis that anyone who says they KNOW, doesn't, "doubt" in my mind is not a tool to be use to constantly affirm one's faith, but a tool to use to make sure we haven't strayed into error. Two sides of the same coin, maybe, but we're facing in opposite directions.

ETA:

Does that doubt extend to God himself? I'd say yes. Does it have implications for atheists too? Is there something wrong with being absolutely certain about the non-existence of God—saying not that you've met God, but that you know nobody ever has or will? Yeah, I think so.

I think part of the problem here is that we on both sides of this debate tend to regard a little doubt as enough to invalidate one's entire position. Does my conviction that there is no god collapse like a house of cards because I can say "in theory, I could be wrong"? Does a believer's conviction that god exists melt into a puddle because he has doubts about some things? I find that would be a cheap way try to win an argument. Not very satisfying.

>25 timspalding: I can't see this says anything about pretending or feigning. You seem to have added that notion, entirely inappropriately.

One of the things that perplexes me about Wager 1.0 (and 2.0 as well, I suppose) is the notion that choosing to believe and believing are the same thing. Suppose you really don't believe: how can you win the wager by deciding to choose to believe when, in truth, you still don't believe -- you're only feigning? At least at the moment of choosing you're only feigning; your "choice" is, presumably, to set in motion some activities or events that will result in your believing.

Surely Pascal can't be saying that choosing to believe suddenly means you believe, when before you didn't.

>27 jburlinson:

Right. You're not fooling God.

>28 timspalding: Right. You're not fooling God.

So now a person's in the same boat with Jonathan Edwards -- am I saved or am I damned? Do I really believe, or do I only want to believe so bad that I've convinced myself that I do believe, even though I don't (in my heart)?

What if I do believe, even if I tell everyone (including myself) that I don't believe, because I just can't stand to accept the thought that I'm so credulous as to believe?

>26 southernbooklady: I could be convinced that unicorns exist but that would require evidence I found convincing:

I was going to start in again about unicorns being electrochemical events within a nervous system (like everything else in our experience), but I restrained myself, so you'd be proud of me. :)

>3 timspalding:

Tim, you're the one misreading the paragraph in question.

The guy explicitly, clearly, and unambiguously lists "meditation and charitable works" as examples of "religious activities".

Several of us disagree with that description of those activities.

It's not a question of "jumping at phrases" - it's a reaction to the argument actually being made on the page.

Yes, IF those are "religious" activities AND
IF one finds them "onerous"
THEN yes, you can construct the case that you want to build upon that at #7;

but several people here have explicitly told you that the foundations of his case are both wrong AND offensive.

The argument built upon that simply fails.

"And, it may well turn out that uniquely religious activities such as respiration and digestion have their own significant measure of worldly satisfaction. Given all this, what basis is there for refusing the wager?"

The basis is: he's wrong about the premises of the wager.

>31 AsYouKnow_Bob:

I'm very surprised you don't understand the argument. Yes, he lists them as religious activities. That doesn't mean they're exclusively religious activities.

If someone were to say "Become a Jain!" someone else might say "But I don't want to be vegetarian!" Then you might discuss that. But it doesn't mean only Jains are vegetarian.

Several of us disagree with that description of those activities.

Several of you have trouble following the logic of the argument. I don't suppose there's much more to say, since we're not arguing about the same argument, but about a real argument you might disagree with and an argument you created and dislike.

>32 timspalding: I'm very surprised you don't understand the argument. Yes, he lists them as religious activities. That doesn't mean they're exclusively religious activities.

I get what you're saying about the argument, but Gutting has to take the responsibility for vitiating the force of that argument by his use of these two examples that, as you say, are not "exclusively religious". Whether he's being disingenuous by doing so, I can't tell; perhaps he just made poor choices. It's likely he wouldn't have invited confusion if he'd referenced activities like "prayer" or "sacraments", which are more unambiguously religious, but that also might provide some measure of "worldly satisfaction".

>27 jburlinson:, >28 timspalding:

Right. That's why for me the wager has always been a non-starter. Nonsensical, even. Couldn't figure out why plenty of smart people expended energies on it.

>32 timspalding: If someone were to say "Become a Jain!" someone else might say "But I don't want to be vegetarian!"

If someone were to say "Become a Muslim!" a Christian might say "But I don't want to engage in charitable works!".

we're not arguing about the same argument,

You're editing the argument until it sounds palatable to you. The words are right there. In your own words, It merely says that one argument against his case is that practices like meditation and charitable giving are onerous.. Would you accept that if a Muslim thought that a major argument against his case for Islam was that Christians felt that charitable giving was onerous?

It's not a real argument against his case; it is a real argument against his case that the best argument he could think of it against his case was that "practices like meditation and charitable giving are onerous."

#19 Tim

"The immensely important truth of the existence of God is indeed only available through religion and spirituality, broadly defined. It may not exist at all. There may be other immensely important truths. (Surely there are.) But you seem to believe one can get pizza without being open to pizza."

1. This has been part of my point all along. You seem to want to have it both ways. You want to claim that the author is not claiming that one accept that meditation and charitable acts are connected to god and at the same time you want to say that they are. The author is fairly sly in his statements, but it is quite clear that he means that charity and mediation have special religious power. He's not claiming that they are only religious... oh no no... He's just claiming that they have mystical importance when one sees the light. That's where some of us are calling bullshit.

2. In addition, you took that statement out of context. The second half was: "and if one concedes this point before beginning this, then one is not likely an atheist or an agnostic of any kind. So, there's not much point in the idea."

The author isn't trying to get the low hanging fruit. He's picking up rotten apples already on the ground.

He's not really talking to atheists or agnostics. He's speaking to lapsed Christians.

I don't see this as any stronger an argument than the original (which had more holes than last day underwear).

Hey, at least they're finally trying to patch the bugs in the first release, though... However disingenuously may be the case.

>27 jburlinson:

I agree that one of the key problems with the whole scenario is the question of whether it is possible to choose to believe something.

On one side, if you don't believe you can choose to believe something, then you bring in whole slew of questions about the validity of all your beliefs. The story goes, I saw some evidence, I thought about what I saw, applied the process of reason, I decided that what I saw was an elephant. Therefore I am justified in believing I saw an elephant. I choose to believe I saw an elephant.

If you didn't choose to believe, if you were not applying the process of reason, but went straight from the sense impression of seeing what you thought was an elephant to believing you saw an elephant, then no choice is involved.

If instead of "elephant" we substitute "the Higgs Boson", "the murderer" or "God", then if we can't choose to believe then all our beliefs about science, justice, religion and reason are called into question.

"If instead of "elephant" we substitute "the Higgs Boson", "the murderer" or "God", then if we can't choose to believe then all our beliefs about science, justice and religion are called into question."

The problem with this is things found in science can be repeatedly found through following the same set of guidelines, but this is not true of religious experiences.

(Now I wait as you will tell me this isn't true, even though it is.)

Gutting ¶5: ... doubt may keep that door open. I say “may” because doubt can express indifference to what is doubted. I don’t know and I don’t care whether there is an even number of stars or whether there are planets made of purple rock.

My problem here is that flat-out ignorance is not a form of doubt; it's ignorance.

then:
Indifferent doubt is the practical equivalent of denial, since both refuse to take a given belief as a viable possibility

Huh? I am, in fact, indifferently ignorant of whether the stars in the sky are even or odd in their multitude. It does not follow that I deny either possibility.

next:
But doubt may also be open to and even desirous of what it doubts. I may doubt that I will ever understand and appreciate Pierre Boulez’s music, but still hope that I someday will.

This desirous doubt sounds to me a lot like curiosity. Calling it that would lead to a very different discussion.

¶6: This means, first, that they should hope — and therefore desire — that they might find a higher meaning and value to their existence by making contact with a beneficent power beyond the natural world. There’s no need to further specify the nature of this power in terms, say, of the teachings of a particular religion.

At this point in the process, is there any justification for Gutting to assume that the hypothetical power beyond the natural world is beneficent? I've never understood the basis for this assumption, outside of doctrine.

This word "beneficent" is for me the source of the objections to ¶7. The "many people" who testify (if you wish) to the value of meditation, etc., are made to sound like a group that includes only proponents of a beneficent power beyond the natural world. This, of course, is misleading.

That's enough for now.

>39 inkdrinker:

You missed the point. Whether you are deciding to accept the result of a scientific experiment by applying reason or deciding to believe in God based on the experience of an apparition, in both cases you are choosing to believe.

If we can't choose to believe, then the validity of both resultant beliefs is called into question. I had no choice but to believe in the Higgs Boson, whether it exists or not. I had no choice but to believe in God, whether God exists or not. So don't you can't blame me either way.

No ... YOU missed the point once again when it comes to science. Choosing to believe something which can be repeatedly shown and that I can even do myself with the instructions from the original scientists makes good sense. Choosing to believe something I and no one else can ever replicate isn't very smart.

>42 inkdrinker: Choosing to believe something I and no one else can ever replicate isn't very smart.

But I think rrp is saying one can still choose to do so, regardless of how foolish that might be.

Choosing to believe something which can be repeatedly shown and that I can even do myself with the instructions from the original scientists makes good sense.

Once again, rrp might argue that that's still a choice -- perhaps a better-founded choice, but still a choice.

YOU missed the point once again when it comes to science.

Science doesn't constrain anyone to "choose to believe" anything. It's a method for gathering and analyzing evidence. What one chooses to do with the evidence is up to the chooser.

>42 inkdrinker:

What >43 jburlinson: said.

But you are right to include likelihood in your process of evaluating evidence before you make your choice, to believe or not to believe. However, you didn't include that other important variable, cost. Cost is an important variable in Pascal's Wager (and, we might add, in modern decision making theory).

If you choose not to believe in the existence of the Higgs Boson, and the Higgs Boson does indeed exist, what has that choice cost you?

If you choose not to believe in the existence of the God, and God does indeed exist, what has that choice cost you?

>43 jburlinson:

We are still left with the question, is it possible to choose to believe something.

If we were to visit the experimental epistemologist and his cerebroscope, and I offered you $1,000,000 if you could choose to believe that I have a candy striped unicorn in a diamond encrusted pen in my back yard, do you think you could take my $1,000,000? I'd guess not.

However, say if offered you odds of 1:1,000,000 that there is a candy striped unicorn in a diamond encrusted pen in my back yard, would you take the bet? (To be clear, the bet would be -- you would give me $1,000,000 if there is, I would give you $1 is there is not.) I'd guess not.

So, you may have a small residual doubt that I may indeed have a candy striped unicorn in a diamond encrusted pen in my back yard, a doubt which is quantified by your aversion to risking $1,000,000 for the reward of $1 to find out.

Gutting's Pascal's Wager 2.0 won't work on someone who is certain that there is nothing beyond the natural world. It only works on those who have a modicum of doubt, however small.

And we should all remember what Bertrand Russell said about being certain.

This fine tuning of Pascal's Wager seems to me even more dishonest than the original. Which does not, in my experience, improve ones life.

The original Pascal's wager seems to present a God who will reward his creatures for violating the intellectual consciences with which he has endowed them. This version appears to be essentially similar.

>46 BooksCatsEtc: "dishonest" seems an interesting choice of work, and one I would not have expected. Care to explain?

>47 paradoxosalpha: Again, an odd choice of words -- "violating the intellectual consciences". In terms of intellectual status, I would have thought that Pascal was right up there with the scientific greats; after all he has a physical unit named after him. I very much doubt he was violating his intellectual conscience by formulating his wager. Gutting isn't so dull either. So why choose those words?

>49 rrp:

Have you read Pascal's original "wager"?

>50 paradoxosalpha: Yes. It's intriguing, isn't it? And historically significant.

I emailed the author Gary Gutting, philosophy prof and author of Foucault: A Very Short Introduction, French Philosophy in the Twentieth Century and the just-released What Philosophy Can Do, and he replied, and has or will make an account.

I'm currently reading the latest book (What Philosophy Can do), an exercise in "public philosophy." It starts with a rather excellent discussion of how to argue, rather than quarrel. In particular he makes the case for giving your opponents their due--to construct the best possible version of their argument. As he points out, getting inside your opponents logic is the best way to actually beat them. I'd have every LibraryThing debater read that part if I could (which is not to say I've always lived up to it).

As for this argument, and in his absence, I shall merely retail his comment that @rrp and I are doing a good job explaining what he means. Take that for what you will. Obviously it doesn't mean any of us are right.

If you have any questions for him, about this piece or about his book, let's have them out. I'll be interviewing him about What Philosophy Can Do as soon as I finish it.

Edited to fix link.

If you have any questions for him, about this piece or about his book, let's have them out.

Great! Will there be a new thread to talk about the book?

Well, I doubt we'll all read it. I'd like to find a selection somewhere, but I can't…

>52 timspalding: If you have any questions for him, about this piece or about his book, let's have them out.

Thanks, Tim, for making this connection. If you get a chance to ask him, you might question him about his intention behind the statement that seems to have exercised so many people on this forum:

"We can decide for ourselves how much worldly satisfaction is worth giving up for the sake of possible greater spiritual happiness. And, it may well turn out that religious activities such as meditation and charitable works have their own significant measure of worldly satisfaction. Given all this, what basis is there for refusing the wager?"

Did he mean to imply that meditation and/or charitable works are exclusively or even primarily "religious" activities? Did he mean that most, if not all, religions have a meditative/contemplative and/or "good works" aspect? Or did he mean something else?

Furthermore, does he mean that many might consider meditation and/or charitable works to be onerous, or, at least, things that require effort that many people don't enjoy?

I would also be interested in his take on whether or not "believing" and "choosing to believe" are the same thing.

Thanks for passing these questions along.

>52 timspalding: In particular he makes the case for giving your opponents their due--to construct the best possible version of their argument.

Which I think is missing the point here. Claiming that having to do charitable works is a significant objection to agnostics becoming religious is false and offensive. That this version of the argument contains that is a showstopper.

>56 prosfilaes:

But in #52 Tim was summarizing Gutting's suggestion of how to conduct a discussion, not what Gutting was discussing in his NYT piece on Pascal's revised wager.

>56 prosfilaes: That this version of the argument contains that is a showstopper.

But this version of the argument doesn't contain that. Mentioning "charitable works" is not a significant element of the argument, it's only a flawed example.

The new version of the wager is really the same as the old version -- that the benefit for the person who accepts the wager and wins more than offsets the cost to the person who accepts the wager and loses, whereas for the person who refuses the wager, there's really no way to win either way.

whereas for the person who refuses the wager, there's really no way to win either way.

Refusing the wager is winning.

>59 StormRaven: And what is the prize?

>60 jburlinson:

Do you find it difficult to "give your opponents their due--to construct the best possible version of their argument" when they don't reply to simple requests for clarification? (e.g. >59 StormRaven: or >51 rrp:)? It seems to me that many don't want a discussion, just "sound and fury".

>58 jburlinson: In Pascal's Wager, Pascal invented the decision matrix, and you are right, the two arguments have the same structure wuth the same decision matrix. I don't know how to do table is LibraryThing, but let's try. Here's the basic decision matrix.

If you choose A, and B is true the result is R1.
If you choose A, and B is false the result is R2.
If you don't choose A, and B is true the result is R3.
If you don't choose A, and B is false the result is R4.

In both arguments, if you choose A, the worst outcome is at least as good as the best outcome of not choosing A. (R1>R2, R4>R3, R2>=R4). So you should choose A.

In Pascal's Wager 1.0 , A is "to believe in God" and B is "God Exists".

R1 is gain of an infinite reward.
R2 is no gain or loss
R3 is to loose, well we shouldn't speculate
R4 is no gain or loss

In Pascal's Wager 2.0, A is more complicated -- "to doubt the atheist position that there is nothing beyond the natural world and to seek paths that might lead to contact with something beyond the natural world." B is "there is something beyond the natural world, and it is Good".

R1 is potential gain of contact and infinite reward.
R2 is the gain of the reward of the seeker minus the opportunity cost.
R3 is a wasted life
R4 is no gain or loss

For this to work we need again that the worst outcome of choosing A is at least as good as the best outcome of not choosing A. (R1>R2, R4>R3, R2>=R4). That is we need is the gain of the reward of the seeker minus the opportunity cost to be either positive or neither a gain nor a loss. So it all depends on whether the rewards of the seeker are greater than the opportunity costs, and one could argue they are, for most people.

My question for Prof Gutting would be that although 2.0 does not require a belief in God, or a choice to believe in God, it does require a belief, a belief that doubts the atheist position that there is nothing beyond the natural world. I think that is assumed as a starting position, so the argument doesn't work for an atheist who has no doubts. The doubter has to make a choice to seek the path, to choose to believe that seeking the path might be beneficial. So it still involves a belief and a choice of that belief, just like Pascal's Wager 1.0, does it not? And can one really choose a belief?

I would also ask the question, is contact with something beyond the natural world necessarily Good?

Edited. R2 switch R3.

>62 rrp: R3 is a wasted life

This might be a little harsh. If B (in your formulation) is true, it would seem that the probability is that no life is wasted. Certainly a life lived as an atheist who meditates and performs charitable works, among other things, would not be wasted.

>60 jburlinson: Do you find it difficult to "give your opponents their due--to construct the best possible version of their argument" when they don't reply to simple requests for clarification?

I don't know that I view the other people who regularly contribute to this forum as opponents. I tend to try to say what I think and appreciate it when somebody else responds -- in any way. Sometimes it does seem as if the responses are some sort of attempt to score points, but who can tell? And who is judging the points or even keeping track? (The likelihood is that the points are only awarded in our own minds, so there's a definite risk of bias going on.) If someone is only trying to score points and then refuses to reply to something, I figure it's because the person doesn't see an opportunity for a score.

>63 jburlinson:

Yes. Fair enough.

But it would still seem to be an opportunity lost. If there were "something beyond the natural world, and it is Good" and you failed to actively seek it, surely that would be a worse result than not seeking it.

Of course, it begs the question whether by seeking you are likely to find. Maybe not seeking is the better strategy to find it.

>64 jburlinson:

Fair enough again. "Opponent" was from Tim at >52 timspalding:; I agree it's a term to be avoided. But you have an interesting point about scoring "points". Would you like us to award you some for that? :-)

As rrp touched on, the Wager is flawed right from the start since it is based on the idea that beliefs can be consciously chosen and of course that is not possible.

For me, the real problem with the argument is the assumption that there are only two possibilities, that there is either a benevolent God or there isn't. What if God punishes people to hell for all eternity for believing in him. It doesn't make sense, but why would God have to make sense. If we're to imagine all possibilities a mad, vengeful God is just as likely as a kind, benevolent God.

>68 jjwilson61:

How might one calculate the likelihood of such things? Surely the answer isn't "100% divided by the number of possibilities I can think of."

Might we argue that some are more likely than others--for example, that hate is not primary things, but dependent on and secondary to their opposites? As understood by believers, hatred is a lack of love, but love is not a lack of hate. (Indeed, in Christian theology, one would really say that the opposite of love is indifference, not hate. Hate is perverted love.) Assuming we're talking about God—all knowing, all powerful, eternal, without rival, etc.—I'd be minded to make an indifferent God a more likely possibility, not a hateful one.

>69 timspalding: There is no way to calculate the odds of such things so the whole idea of the wager is nonsense.

Has any atheist you've known ever been convinced by that argument?

>69 timspalding: Assuming we're talking about God—all knowing, all powerful, eternal, without rival, etc.

Which is surely assuming a lot of what is under debate.

Might we argue that some are more likely than others

Most rational argument goes on of two directions; we've seen many, many tornadoes, and this is when and where they like to hit. Or we know how gravity works, and thus this is what a planet orbiting two stars would look like. In the best cases, some combination of the two; we have some deep understanding, and many examples to compare against, and the two are giving us similar answers.

Unfortunately, we're literally debating whether there is zero or one of these beings, so argument from example is a failure. Unlike, say, the Loch Ness monster, where we can at least fall back on what other large aquatic animals are like, we generally dismiss the idea of there being even an analogous creature; no Athena or even Hercules. Likewise, we have no idea what parameters to stick in the model. We have no just reason to argue that some are more likely than others.

It's clear humans would make a defective example, but we could talk about Rattus norvegicus and humans. In which case, at best, God doesn't have high standards for us, but we should probably not bite them (and we need to hope they understand our needs and don't try to keep us alone in a tiny cage.) At worst, we're going to be tormented until we're killed, all in the name of science, or find that when we thought we were house guests, God considered us vermin. That's not indifference, and I'd say that even the love/hate issue is missing the salient issues; a rat is rarely judged, and their choices except in the most extreme are irrelevant.

>70 jjwilson61:

Oh, I don't know. Which do you think is more likely?

1. God is the powerful, all-knowing and all good creator of the universe, as believed by 56% of the world's population, grounded in millennia of belief, and so forth.
2. God lives on an asteroid in Vega, is very limited, but knows a great deal about what goes on in professional baseball and can play any tune ever written on his kazoo.

Unfortunately, we're literally debating whether there is zero or one of these beings, so argument from example is a failure. Unlike, say, the Loch Ness monster, where we can at least fall back on what other large aquatic animals are like, we generally dismiss the idea of there being even an analogous creature; no Athena or even Hercules. Likewise, we have no idea what parameters to stick in the model. We have no just reason to argue that some are more likely than others.

If the Loch Ness monster exists, do you think it's something like what many it's supposed to be like—as claimed by people who say they've seen in—or do you think it's an enormous pink and yellow panda?

>72 timspalding: Neither choice sounds at all likely to me. Sorry.

>72 timspalding:

2 is extravagantly unlikely, but more likely than 1. (And with no consequences for us anyway.)

>72 timspalding: If the Loch Ness monster exists, do you think it's something like what many it's supposed to be like—as claimed by people who say they've seen in—or do you think it's an enormous pink and yellow panda?

People see what they expect to see, and what they want to see. People who say they've seen it have interpreted it in the light of their preconceptions. "An enormous pink and yellow panda" is mockery; if it's real, I wouldn't be surprised if Lovecraft and friends were more correct, that it's not a creature like what we know, but something on the edge of reality that we haven't got close to a good description of.

When driving close to the Grand Canyon at night, a bat crossed in front of my car. It had between four and seven wings. Naturally, I know enough about bats to know it had two wings and it was just the sudden appearance and disappearance of a fast-moving flying animal that made me miscount, but that's suppressing my observations for what I "know" to be true.

1. God is the powerful, all-knowing and all good creator of the universe, as believed by 56% of the world's population, grounded in millennia of belief, and so forth.

Belief is problematic. I don't know why it should have any impact on what we think God is like at all. Instead of all the idle theorizing laid on top, counted by how many people believe it, why don't we take, measure and weigh the most direct reports? We have stories, of him drowning the world in a flood, commanding a father to kill his child, murdering everyone in Sodom and Gomorrah, sending bears to kill 40 kids. We can take the reports of people allegedly directly in contact with God, like Jesus and Mohammed, and the authors of A Course in Miracles and the Urantia book (though "I'm all-powerful, all-knowing and all-good" is not exactly the type of self-testimony that anyone puts much weight on.)

Is a world-wide flood the tool of an all-powerful, all-good god? Does it matter if it didn't happen, if God made no attempt to deny its reality? What really do we mean by good? With great power comes great responsibility, and if Lois Lane was in a war zone and Superman decided to just murder 40 stone-throwing kids to protect her, would we really consider Superman the good guy? Thirteen seconds: Confrontation at Kent State was interesting in part because it showed how the National Guard was backed into a corner, in a way no real superhero could have been; yet God seems to have just as violent in protecting his people, for being all-powerful, without the limitations Superman or Batman have. If we're talking about God via description, we should ignore all the theorizing built on top.

All I sought to show was that there are quite reasonable ground for believing some possible attribute-combinations for "God" are more likely than others, not that God is himself likely.

As regards the latter, go argue with someone else.

>72 timspalding:


1. God is the powerful, all-knowing and all good creator of the universe, as believed by 56% of the world's population, grounded in millennia of belief, and so forth.
2. God lives on an asteroid in Vega, is very limited, but knows a great deal about what goes on in professional baseball and can play any tune ever written on his kazoo.


Which is heavier: cats, justice, or rainbows? A question that has about as much meaning as your example 2, to which just one objection is that such a being does not equate even remotely to any one of the many that have been called "God" by various different peoples throughout history. And even your 1. doesn't refer to those sections of the Old Testament and Q'ran which portray God as a petty, jealous and vengeful patriarch.

>77 Tid:

One of my favorite genres of atheist discourse is where atheists tell Christians and Muslims what their scriptures are really about and what they believe.

>78 timspalding: It seems to me that the Pascal's Wager 2.0 argument is based on incorrect assumptions about what atheists believe. So we're even.

>79 jjwilson61:
Yes, I think the assumption is that an atheist understands what is being referred to when a believer talks about "God". I think many or most atheists find the concept unintelligible or even gibberish.

>76 timspalding:
"All I sought to show was that there are quite reasonable ground for believing some possible attribute-combinations for "God" are more likely than others, not that God is himself likely."

Defining the terms is basic to offering a wager, no? If I open betting on the "big game" wouldn't you want to know which game in which sport before you lay your money down?

>76 timspalding: All I sought to show was that there are quite reasonable ground for believing some possible attribute-combinations for "God" are more likely than others,

>52 timspalding: In particular he makes the case for giving your opponents their due--to construct the best possible version of their argument. As he points out, getting inside your opponents logic is the best way to actually beat them.

How exactly does comparing

1. God is the powerful, all-knowing and all good creator of the universe, as believed by 56% of the world's population, grounded in millennia of belief, and so forth.

to

2. God lives on an asteroid in Vega, is very limited, but knows a great deal about what goes on in professional baseball and can play any tune ever written on his kazoo.

say anything about the best possible version of anyone's argument? Even as this part of this argument goes, that's a silly parody version of it.

Jjwilson claimed "For me, the real problem with the argument is the assumption that there are only two possibilities, that there is either a benevolent God or there isn't. What if God punishes people to hell for all eternity for believing in him. It doesn't make sense, but why would God have to make sense. If we're to imagine all possibilities a mad, vengeful God is just as likely as a kind, benevolent God."

I didn't say "you're wrong, and here's a perfect argument to refute it." I said "Oh, I don't know." Because while I can't perfectly prove it, indeed I find the idea that a "God who doesn't make sense" and "punishes people to hell for all eternity for believing in him" less likely than God as conceived by any or all of the world's major religions.

Is a God who punishes people for believing in him as silly as a God who lives on an asteroid in Vega? Meh. They're silly in different ways, certainly. But my point was to establish the wrongheadedness of "If we're to imagine all possibilities," then all possibilities are equally likely. Even if Evil-God were logically possible, not everything logically possible is equally likely.

>78 timspalding:

"One of my favorite genres of atheist discourse is where atheists tell Christians and Muslims what their scriptures are really about and what they believe."

Is that one of your typically obscure put-downs or were you actually trying to communicate something?

By the way, no-one can tell someone else what they believe (where is this?), but a scripturally educated and intelligent atheist may indeed know more about Christianity and Islam than someone who simply turns up at church / mosque every week and never once thinks about what it is all about. The religious person who assumes that an atheist knows nothing about religion is simply arrogant.

Who are these alleged 56%? "Abrahamic" believers as identified by the collation of sects? Their commonalities have more to do with shared mythic narrative than any well-defined theological perceptions.

I never knew metaphysics was driven by popularity, either.

Let's say we are rats, looking to humans as Gods? What are the odds we'd find that the humans were all-knowing and all-good from our perspective? Lab rats may get punished from their perspective for reasons that they certainly don't understand, and if we had a model of rat belief, there would be lab rats being punished by their god for believing in their god, and the rats wouldn't understand and wouldn't appreciate that their God could get a research paper out of it. Even pet owners often fall far clear of the mark of all-good and all-knowing; pet rats are kept alone because the owners don't understand how important it is to keep them in pairs (failure of all-knowing) or because they're more concerned about their ease than the rat's companionship needs (failure of all-good). Pets frequently end up at the vet's because they've eaten something they shouldn't, again because the owner wasn't aware of the danger of having those laying around or because they couldn't be bothered to pick it up.

What would we say to a rat prophet who says that there's an all-knowing, all-good, all-powerful God looking after rats and that humans were merely his minions? We'd snerk, but their story of Job wouldn't be that much different from ours. What would you say to an angel that ran into you at a bar (/insert appropriate setting here) and unloaded on you, to the effect of being a member of Angels for the Ethical Treatment of Humans (AETH) is hard, and just because humans were created for the enjoyment and use of angels doesn't mean that all the stuff angels pull on us is right. That is, we arguably have your God, but all-good is from the viewpoint of the angels, not the subangelic beings created for them.

>82 timspalding: as conceived by any or all of the world's major religions.

Whose expansion seems to have much more to do with a missionary/expansionist spirit instead of inherent truth. The Crusades weren't a meeting of philosophers.

>82 timspalding: not everything logically possible is equally likely.

What are the odds if I roll a six-sided die that it comes up 6? Right, you don't have enough information to know, because FATE dice have two +, two - and two blank sides, and the name seems oddly appropriate for this argument. (The last six sided dice I rolled were from Roll for the Galaxy, a bunch of symbols with no 6s, where each color of die held different counts of symbols, so assuming that six-sided dice are labeled 1-6 really is an unwarranted assumption from my perspective.) You're claiming as most likely something that's been often dismissed as logically impossible, so your idea that you can give even vague odds seems a bit of hubris.

It reminds me of a discussion in the back of The Bermuda Triangle Mystery Solved, of the arguments for the Bermuda Triangle being but one of eight symmetrically placed spots on the globe, where you're wildly extrapolating from what was a shaky base to start with.

>85 prosfilaes: Whose expansion seems to have much more to do with a missionary/expansionist spirit instead of inherent truth. The Crusades weren't a meeting of philosophers.

I think Spanish Colonialism is an even better example.

>84 paradoxosalpha:

Jews, Christians and Muslims (and some others) share some mythic narratives, indeed. But there are profound theological and philosophical commonalities. They all share a belief in radical monotheism. They believe in an omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent God. They believe God is the creator of the universe, but separate from it. They believe he is highly interested in humanity and involved in history. They believe he is in some sense a personal God, with whom one can have a relationship, especially in prayer, but also ultimately unknowable. He judges morality, and cares whether humans follow it. All three ascribe a litany of traits to God, such as mercy, a love of justice, etc.

The list could be extended. The three largest, at least, believe in somewhat similar concepts of revelation—that God wants to and has revealed things to humanity. Although monotheism need not be scriptural, all three biggies are scriptural, and although much differs, there are extensive parallelisms between how the three religions deal with the theology, philosophy and simple practicalities of interpretation.

The end result is that well-meaning believers share the most basic and fundamental theological beliefs, and a good deal of language for discussing it. Apart from some ignorant Americans, all three regard the other groups as worshipping the same God, albeit imperfectly. And, throughout history, there has been a continuous dialogue and flow of ideas between the religions on those bases, both on the level of the common people and between their religious philosophers.

What part of this is new to you? What part could you honestly contest?

I think Spanish Colonialism is an even better example.

Indeed, a much better one.

It's peculiar how some people fixate on the Crusades. The Crusades were contrary to how Christian should act, but, in their context, the short-lived and always tenuous conquest of a small and poor area. Anyone with a little Medieval or early-Modern history could rattle off a few dozen inter-religious conquests more bloody, successful, significant, long-lasting and often more recent.

>87 timspalding: They all share a belief in radical monotheism.

Do you suppose you've never met an atheist Reform Jew?
Do you consider the veneration of saints in Roman Catholicism to be "radically monotheistic"?
Did you know that many Muslims would disagree that Christianity is "radically monotheistic"?

"I will unite the Christians, the Muslims and the Jews. From now on, you shall be known as Chrismujews! Because in the end, aren't all religions the same?" --Homer Simpson

>89 paradoxosalpha:

Do you suppose you've never met an atheist Reform Jew?

Indeed, I would not consider a Jew (or, say, the occasional Episcopal) who denies the existence of God highly representative of the Abrahamic theological traditions.

Do you consider the veneration of saints in Roman Catholicism to be "radically monotheistic"?

Yes. To say otherwise is extremely ignorant, not to mention offensive. Put away your Chick tract.

Did you know that many Muslims would disagree that Christianity is "radically monotheistic"?

Indeed. The condemnation is in the Koran itself. They even mosaiced around the Dome of the Rock, pointing--we may presume--at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Muslims still regard Christians as worshipping the same Deity.

>90 timspalding: highly representative

If you recall, my original pause was regarding the unsubstantiated "56%" statistic. That number, I presume, was arrived at by making assumptions about entire populations identified by sect, when such sects are both more varied and more diverse than would be the case if we reduce them to "highly representative" elements. That's all. Your metaphysics-by-popularity also seems to work on the basis of a rather flawed caucus system.

It's not just anti-Catholic Chick tracts that want to indict the cult of saints, by the way. Wahhabi Muslims similarly discountenance the Shiite veneration of saints as impurity of monotheism (and with greater salience considering the notion of shirk). There are highly significant tensions and spectra of this sort throughout the morass of your "three biggies." Hand-waving doesn't erase them.

>91 paradoxosalpha:

I don't have time for this nonsense.

>88 timspalding: I think Spanish Colonialism is an even better example.

Indeed, a much better one.

I think that's missing my point. When I said the Crusades wasn't a meeting of philosophers, I was talking about both sides. The Crusades was a meeting of two aggressively expansionist religions. Neither of them were founded in Jerusalem, but both of them were bringing armies to bear on "a small and poor area" that neither had a particular claim to before they brought armies there to make that claim.

>87 timspalding: They believe in an omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent God

I always get skeptical about claims that you can assign subtle theological traits to mass chunks of the population. To look at actual survey data:

http://www.pewforum.org/2018/04/25/when-americans-say-they-believe-in-god-what-d... is interesting; only 33% of American Jews, 69% of American Catholics and 80% of American Christians (inclusive of Catholics). say they believe in the God of the Bible, for example, "In total, three-quarters of U.S. Christians believe that God" (including some higher power not the God of the Bible) "possesses all three of these attributes – that the deity is loving, omniscient and omnipotent", but only 61% of Catholics. It's all American and there weren't enough Muslims to count, but if that 61% of Catholics holds, it doesn't do much for your case.

>93 prosfilaes:

What on earth do you mean by saying that neither Christianity nor Islam was founded in Jerusalem? And don't go all Roman on me.

>93 prosfilaes: skeptical about claims that you can assign subtle theological traits to mass chunks of the population (pew forum stats)

Tim doesn't have time for that nonsense.

>87 timspalding:

"They believe in an omniscient, omnipotent and omnibenevolent God. They believe God is the creator of the universe, but separate from it. They believe he is highly interested in humanity and involved in history."

Except that a whole heap of post-Enlightenment Christian theology doesn't go along with this - nor did Medieval mystics like Bernard of Clairvaux and Meister Eckhart. Certainly, Teilhard de Chardin, Don Cupitt, and more recently John Shelby Spong, Marcus Borg and - from your tradition - John Dominic Crossan have "no time for this nonsense".

I think we can partially and useful distinguish adherence to a religion and full knowledge or acceptance of it. So, for example, we can say that Catholicism is trinitarian, even though my Catholic twelve year-old son insists that three things can't be one thing.

Also, I think these things are messed up by the different ways we can "be" Christian. A lot of people describe themselves as Catholic because they were raised Catholic. They are cultural Catholics. But they don't believe it. I'm glad to allow people to call themselves whatever they want, without policing. But poll results should not confuse cultural and credal identity.

As regards the poll, I'm a Catholic Christian. I even teach catechism classes. But I'm not sure I believe in "God as described in the Bible." As often happens when Americans talk about religion, there's an unconscious Protestant and fundamentalist framing there—probably not believing fundies, but secular ones.

I believe the Bible is an important aspect of his revelation. But I don't think the Bible is some sort of self-contained and complete God Manual, or that everything God-related in there "describes" him in any sort of simplistic way.

It would be more to say that scripture is the record of our attempt to understand God. At the same time, God is dynamically and progressively involved in our understanding, which would be impossible without his revelation. But "Do you believe in the God of the Bible?" is, to me, sort of like "Are you born again?" or "Is Jesus your personal savior?" It seems simple to an American with no access to the far older and larger Christian tradition, but it mostly makes sense within American's small and weird Protestant communities, and begs a bunch of important questions.

>96 Tid:

Much to disagree with, but I'll start small, so you have the chance to prove your point. What of this does Bernard of Clairvaux dissent from?

>97 timspalding: we can say that Catholicism is trinitarian ...

I don't think we should in this instance; it blurs the distinctions under discussion here. There's a lot of places where you can speak of an amorphous grouping like that, but once it's under discussion, you have to be more precise, talk about "official Roman Catholic doctrine" and the like.

even though my Catholic twelve year-old son insists that three things can't be one thing.

This started when you said "God is the powerful, all-knowing and all good creator of the universe, as believed by 56% of the world's population". So, yeah, instances like your son do matter, because you can't count them if they don't so believe.

But poll results should not confuse cultural and credal identity.

That's complex, but again, I think it questionable to call upon 56% of the world's population and ignore the question of how many of those don't believe but are, say, Irish Catholic or Iranian Muslim, where they're not going to disclaim that religion, no matter what they believe, for various reasons.

But I'm not sure I believe in "God as described in the Bible."

It's an interesting point, but not that relevant; only 61% of Catholics believe that God "possesses all three of these attributes – that the deity is loving, omniscient and omnipotent", inclusive of all those Catholics who believe in a higher power but not the God of the Bible.

>98 timspalding:

My bad. I meant St John of the Cross, not Bernard.

>97 timspalding:

"At the same time, God is dynamically and progressively involved in our understanding, which would be impossible without his revelation."

You dogmatically state this as a fact. It isn't. It's merely a belief.

>100 Tid:

Okay, in what ways did John of the Cross deny the omniscience, omnipotence and omnibenevolence of God?

You dogmatically state this as a fact. It isn't. It's merely a belief.

Sure. That's why it was in a paragraph about my reluctance to sign onto "Do you believe in the God of the Bible?" (I do, but not in the sense the question is asked.) Anyway, that God reveals himself, that God reveals himself progressively, and that God's revelation in scripture is conveyed by mortal men, is the belief of the church for millennia. Insofar as that quick thumbnail attempts to explain what the church has believed, it is an attempt to juxtapose it with the modern, minority tradition of scriptural literalism.

>101 timspalding:

"Okay, in what ways did John of the Cross deny the omniscience, omnipotence and omnibenevolence of God?"

That wasn't the issue. I was responding to "They believe he is highly interested in humanity and involved in history" in >87 timspalding:. As John was not only raised a Christian, but was an ordained priest, he would express himself primarily using Christian terminology. However, few can pin down the primary influences in his writings - they include (in various degrees of arguability, and in addition to the Christian Bible, especially the Song Of Songs) Neo-Dionysius, medieval mystics including the Rhineland group, secular Spanish poetry, and even Islamic thought. Afaik, he didn't specifically address the issues of omniscience, omnipotence and omnibenevolence.

What informed him most however was his experience, which was obviously "ineffable". He expressed it more in terms of negation than of belief, in order to achieve what he described as "union with God". The Long Night Of The Soul, and all that. That experience - being ineffable - can also be, and has been, described as mu ('Nothingness', 'the Void') by Buddhists; indeed, as a perfect expression of it.

It all reinforces my own belief that there is a kind of experience that is subsumed into the different religions, cannot be adequately described or defined by them, but actually has also been experienced by the non-religious and often described as "life changing" without reference to God or equivalent super-being.

>102 Tid: there is a kind of experience that is subsumed into the different religions, cannot be adequately described or defined by them

The mystic attainment may be defined as the Union of the Soul with God, or as the realization of itself, or – there are fifty phrases for the same experience. The same, for whether you are a Christian or a Buddhist, a Theist or (as I am myself, thank God!) an Atheist, the attainment of this one state is as open to you as is nightmare, or madness, or intoxication. (Crowley on Christ, 116)

>103 paradoxosalpha:

Agreed. However I wouldn't describe it as the same as nightmare, madness or intoxication, which are far more common and experienced in various degrees (perhaps 'madness' is too strong a word?) by most of us. The mystical state - which is often expressed by the non-religious as a form of monism, and may be one of the ultimate properties of the universe - seems to be a rarer experience, but I'm not sure why this should be so. It may be connected with evolution, i.e. that the genetic advantage conveyed by it is somewhat obscure and not clearly understood ... yet.