Last Sunday I took Occam’s Razor to Pascal’s Wager. Today let’s address Pascal’s Wager more directly. We’ll be using the same assumptions required to bridge the gap from atheist to Christian and point by point I’ll be offering my objection it it. I will also give each point conservative, and I’d say generous, odds of being correct. I am not going to be using any Bayesian algorithms, just simple odds. These all deal with things that are unknown and/or unknowable, well, technically speaking. If it’s a binary option the most it can have is a 50% chance, but if it competes with other positions it’ll be given an equal probability to all other options.

So let’s start tearing apart Pascal’s Wager:

1. Naturalism is insufficient to explain the cosmos. It’s made great strides, but it will never answer the few remaining big questions about the origins of the universe in general and life in particular.
   • Based on the progress that science has made in the last few centuries, this assumption is pointless and detrimental to society and the advancement of knowledge about how the universe works. If people had historically held on to their supernatural understandings rather than search for natural explanations we would still be flat earthers, geocentrists, creationists, and think that cancer and other diseases are curses from God/the gods. Only by searching for natural explanations can we find a greater understanding and improve our lives.
   • Even though this point should be rejected outright and render Pascal’s Wager a non-starter, I’ll give that one a 1:2 chance since there is no way for knowing for sure that we will find natural explanations for everything, it’s a very reasonable assumption that we will, but there is always that chance that we will hit an apparent permanent roadblock.
2. Your life on this earth will be no worse if you believe in God and ascribe to Christianity than it would be if you don’t.
   • Based on my experience and the experience of countless atheists, life is much better as an atheist. There are also others in various religions who found that their lives got better after their conversion.
   • Given the current societal prejudices in America it could be argued that the increased guilt and loss of personal freedom that comes with Christianity is worth the political and social gains. To a certain extent which way life is better comes down to personal preferences and situation, so I’ll give this one a 1:2 chance.
3. If there is a god, then the god of the Abrahamic faiths is the correct one to choose from out of the millions of gods that have been proposed throughout history.
   • Since there is no evidence for any of them, this point seems completely ridiculous, but we have no way of proving that Yahweh, Vishnu, Thor, and Zeus don’t exist. OK, there is some subjective evidence for each, but each system is mutually exclusive from all the others, so this evidence cancels itself out.
   • It could be argued that pantheons should be counted as one since each god requires all the others to be present, but even then, there are still thousands or even millions of options to choose from.
   • Considering that this is a case of picking one out of anywhere from thousands to hundreds of millions, just to be on the conservative side, I’m giving this one a 1:1,000,000 chance.
4. Christianity (in one of its forms) has the correct understanding of the Abrahamic god and it’s mode of worship is the the correct form of worship of that god.
   • Since each of the Abrahamic faiths are all just revisions of the one that preceded it (think Unix, BSD, and OS X), it’s a pretty simple 1:3 chance.
5. There is an afterlife with the binary option of paradise or torment for all eternity.
   • Since the qualifier of knowing with certainty on this one is to be dead, nobody knows. It seems highly unlikely, heck it’s not even plausible. It really includes two assumptions: (1) there is an afterlife of some kind and (2) if there is then its a binary choice of heaven and hell.
   • Each is an unknown and the second assumption requires the first, so in whole this gets a 1:4 chance.
6. The determining factor in your eternal fate is the belief in this particular god.
   • This seems highly unjust and unfair considering the lack of evidence and that a more fair standard would be whether you lived an ethical life.
   • Even if all of the above is correct, due to the same limitations as above, we can’t know if this is how it works, so this would be a 1:2 chance.
7. Someone who dishonestly feigns belief would be judged favorably, while someone who honestly rejects belief on the grounds of insufficient evidence would be judged unfavorably.
   • Given that God is supposed to be just, merciful, and all knowing, even knowing our thoughts, this one seems completely absurd.
   • Since we don’t know for sure, it’s again a 1:2 chance.
8. God is so narcissistic that this ploy would actually work.
   • If all the above is true, then this would be assured. If this being was as Christians claim he his, then this wouldn’t have a chance of working.
   • This is an unknown so I’ll again give it a 1:2 chance.

Pascal’s wager fails on the grounds that it doesn’t fit with observed reality and that it requires several very illogical and counter intuitive assumptions. As far as the odds go, since each proposition requires the one that precedes it, the probably of each statement is cumulative and thus has to be factored with all the probabilities before it. Therefore the odds that Pascal’s Wager is correct and effective is 1:384,000,000.

I should note one massive flaw in these odds: giving an unknown, regardless of plausibility, a 1:2 chance would also mean that there is a 1:2 chance that I’ll run into Bigfoot on a camping trip this summer and also a 1:2 chance that I’ll pick up actress Eva Green at a bar next time I go out. Neither is plausible, but due to the unknown nature and implicit possibility there is a chance that either could happen.

If we again consider the two assumptions required for atheism:

1. The only way we can know things is if they can be proven empirically.
2. Naturalistic explanations of the cosmos have progressed so far that there is no reason to suspect that a supernatural explanation is required for the few remaining mysteries.

Each one is essentially unknown or unknowable (although highly plausible). So each would be given a 1:2 chance. Thus the odds that an atheist is right would be 1:4.

Not only are the assumptions of Pascal’s Wager painfully absurd, but the odds of it being correct are so low that it is far more likely that you will get cancer, die in a car accident, or be stuck by lightning. Considering that it’s a wager, the odds are so low that it’s not worth it, kind of like buying a Powerball ticket.

Let’s hope that Pascal’s Wager will meet is long overdue final demise.