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From: flink@umcp-cs.UUCP (Paul Torek)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Torek's wager != Pascal's
Message-ID: <2376@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 9-Jan-85 15:56:58 EST
Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.2376
Posted: Wed Jan  9 15:56:58 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 12-Jan-85 07:04:16 EST
Distribution: net
Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD
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From: barry@ames.UUCP (Kenn Barry)
> > [me]...If you believe you have free will and you're wrong, it was out of
> > your power to be correct anyway so you haven't lost anything.  But if
> > you're right, you have gained something by exercising your power 
> > correctly.  Therefore, anything that implies lack of free will can be 
> > dismissed right there.
> 	Essentially, this is a reworking of Pascal's argument for belief
> in God. If you believe in Him, and are wrong, you lose nothing, since
> there is no Heaven or Hell; if you *disbelieve* and are wrong, however,
> you do hard time in the flamey place.

No, there's a crucial difference:  Pascal's argument doesn't cover all the
bases.  If there's a Ubizmo that wants the exact opposite of what the 
Christian G-d is s'posed to want, who will send you to the flamey place
for obeying the big 10 -- then making Pascal's wager can cost you big.  A
priori, Pascal's argument gives one no more reason to believe in one G-d
than in its opposite.

> 	Unfortunately, it shares the same flaw as Pascal's reasoning,
> namely, that we do not believe or disbelieve in things based on the belief's
> utility. I base my beliefs on reason, and believe in them because they
> seem correct, not convenient.                   Kenn Barry

Your dichotomy is a false one.  You can't divorce practical reason from
epistemology (theory of knowledge).  Reason dictates believing what one has 
reasons to believe, and that includes can't-lose propositions like belief
in free will.  It may be true that you don't or even can't bring your
beliefs to follow such reasoning, but that's *your* problem.

				--Paul V. Torek,
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