ipl-logo

Blaise Pascal's Argument For The Existence Of God?

609 Words3 Pages

As stated by Blaise Pascal in the argument of Pascal’s Wager, Pascal claims that most people bet on their lives that God either does or does not exist. In providing his reasoning, the probability of the various outcomes pertaining to finite and infinite gains as well as losses is shown, coming to the conclusion that logically one should believe in God. Although some people believe in God and an afterlife of paradise, we cannot truly grasp the extent of God’s existence. Through assessing Pascal’s argument, it is essential to keep in mind that logically, through the use of probability that one should believe in the existence of God.
Pascal argues that a rational individual should live as though God does exist and seek a righteous life that pertains to living up to God’s will. If God does indeed exist, that individual will stand to receive infinite gains throughout their lifetime such as miracles, the existing favor of God, and most importantly, in the afterlife, they will be able to spend all of eternity in Heaven as a reward from their good doings on earth. On the other hand, if a person decides that they would prefer to not believe in God, the infinite losses such as eternity in Hell will be unavoidable and it is only logical that a person would be willing to receive less significant losses …show more content…

While most individuals formulate decisions through rational reasoning, there are times where we base our decisions on a wager because if there is a chance for one to be provided with infinite gains, a possibility may be taken as a result. In saying this, although proving whether there is an existence or non-existence of God is impossible through human reasoning, some people then decide to live as if though God exists, and some choose to live as if though God does not exist based on the consequences of what they will reap

Show More
Related

Lara Buchak's Can It Be Rational To Have Faith

1347 Words | 6 Pages

In Lara Buchak’s essay, Can It Be Rational to Have Faith? , she asserts that everyday faith statements and religious faith statements share the same attributes. She later states that in order to truly have faith, a person ceases to search for more evidence for their claim, and that having faith can be rational. Although she makes compelling arguments in favor of faith in God, this essay is more hearsay and assumption than actual fact. In this paper, you will see that looking for further evidence would constitute not having faith, but that having faith, at least in the religious sense, is irrational.

Read More

Wager's Argument For The Existence Of God

378 Words | 2 Pages

The ontological argument states that perfection is a part of the concept of God, and that perfection entails existence, and so the concept of God entails God’s existence. However, it can be argued that if God is an infinite goodness, then its contrary, evil, should not exist. Alas, there is evil in the world, and, therefore, God cannot exist. The ontological argument also seeks to demonstrate that God exists on the basis of concept alone. Pascal’s Wager attempts to justify the belief in God with an

Read More

Pascal's Waager Rhetorical Analysis

619 Words | 3 Pages

Argument Against the Argument of Pascal’s Wager In Pascal’s Wager, Pascal pioneered new thoughts and opinions amongst his peers in probability theories by attempting to justify that believing in God is advantageous to one’s personal interest. In this paper, I will argue that Pascal’s argument rationalizing why one should believe in God fails and I will suggest that even if one was to accept Pascal’s wager theory, this will not be a suffice resolution to reap the rewards that God has promised to Christian believers like myself who has chosen to believe in God due to my early childhood teachings, familial and inherited beliefs. Pascal offers a logical reason for believing in God: just as the hypothesis that God's existence is improbable, the

Read More

Mackie's Evil And Omnipotence

933 Words | 4 Pages

The question that is asked time and time again is whether or not god exists. It is evident that people hold different beliefs. It is evident that through some of the beliefs of J.L. Mackie that it could be argued that God does not actually exist. I find this argument to be more agreeable. In Mackie’s Evil and Omnipotence, he argues many points to support why it should be believed that god does not exist.

Read More

Pascal's Wager Argument

1074 Words | 5 Pages

Pascal 's Wager Blaise Pascal takes a unique approach in defending the eternal question of God 's existence. "Pascal 's Wager" is the name given to the argument written by himself stating that it is prudent to believe in God 's existence because it is the best bet. Suppose that there is a winning sweepstakes ticket that is worth a new luxurious car and there are only two tickets to choose from. We know that one of them is the winning ticket, while the other is worth nothing.

Read More

The Explanation Of God And Pensees: Pascal's Wager

786 Words | 4 Pages

If someone believed that God does exist they would obtain Heaven, but if they believed God exists but God doesn’t then they lose nothing. If a person did not believe in God and God does exists then they would obtain Hell and severe misery. If a person did not believe God exists and God does not exist, they would lose nothing. Pascal’s wager states that a person cannot come to know God by reason alone so it is best that a person lives as if God does exist, because a person would not lose anything if God did not exist. Pascal’s wager says it is safer to bet that God does exist and to live a life like God does exist.

Read More

Three Arguments Against Pascal's Wager

630 Words | 3 Pages

Belief is not Decision Pascal’s Wager, the argument that an individual who believes in God’s existence is entitled to infinite gains. There are three objections against Pascal article, including “the wrong motivation”, “too many options” and “Belief not a decision”. Among these three reasonable objections, I believe that the strongest one is “Belief not a decision”, because everything needs a reason as people are born as rational creatures. Otherwise, people believe in the existence of God because they trust that God could bring benefits to them. For me, although the objection is reasonable, I still think the Pascal’s response is stronger.

Read More

William Lane Craig Analysis

1007 Words | 5 Pages

However, such is not the case in today’s world. There currently exists a Jewish version of God, a Christian version of God, a Muslim version, a Hindu version(s), and so on. Every religious group claims to be correct, though no particular religion is proven to have any objective merit over the others. What is to be expected if a believer in the Christian God dies, and learns in the afterlife that the Hindu or Muslim God was correct all along? According to the scenarios established in the wager, a person would indeed have much to lose by solely believing in one specific interpretation of

Read More

Evil And Omnipotence Analysis

1167 Words | 5 Pages

Everything around us is built of our faith in our senses, and our faith in other people. Without faith we are surrounded by the fear of the known, every neighbour could be planning our death, our senses could be simulated by some machine; and without faith in God, for many people can be the difference between bearing the evil of the world and slipping into the world of oblivion and chaos. Yet is this faith in God rational or not? Mackie thinks not, in his essay “Evil and Omnipotence” he uses the problem of evil in the world to expose the irrationality of God. He shows how, the contradicts of an Omni God makes the belief in such a being irrational.

Read More

JL Mackie's Argument For The Existence Of God?

295 Words | 2 Pages

In his essay "The Will to Believe" William James tells us that his purpose is to present "a justification of faith, a defense of our right to adopt a believing attitude in religious matters, in spite of the fact that our merely logical intellect may not have been coerced." Page2. I found his arguments also persuasive because he suggests the existence of God cannot be solve by our intellectual means. James argues that intellectual activity is motivated by two goals: to shun error and believe truth. The choice to believe or not is alive, forced and momentous.

Read More

Similarities Between Pascal And Descartes

991 Words | 4 Pages

We all are guaranteed to fall into Death’s grasp, and we all must act for or against God’s existence. Pascal believes that the intelligent choice is the belief of God - we all have the ability to acquire the possible infinite gain of heaven, with only the small but difficult sacrifice of some things in life. Descartes’ writings also talk about the belief in God. Descartes states that there are generally no undeniable beliefs or propositions, and that the existence and nature of the external world cannot be fully known or understood. Pascal believed in heaven as possible infinite gain, however Descartes believed that the nature and existence of an external world as something that cannot be fully known or understood.

Read More

The Problems With Believing At Will Summary

915 Words | 4 Pages

It is impossible to choose what we believe in solely based on our will. Because of that, Pascal’s argument for the benefits of believing in God does not help whether or not we are able to believe in God. Pascal’s wager, in summary, explains that it is better to believe in God and lose nothing if God did not exist, then to not believe in God and suffer for an eternity if God did exist. Let’s say that there was a man that did not believe in God. After reading about Pascal’s arguments, he agreed that it would be less risky to believe in the existence of God rather than not.

Read More

Research Paper On Afterlife

850 Words | 4 Pages

“If God does not exist, everything is permissible” (Sartre, 28-29). This means that if God does not exist then there is nothing for man to rely on and there is no room for making excuses. We are then led to take responsibility for all of our actions, good and bad. This includes all our failures, heartbreaks, premature death, etc. We are put in this world and have no choice but to be responsible for everything that happens to us and to the people who are affected by our actions.

Read More

God Can Be Rational Without Proof For God's Existence

752 Words | 4 Pages

In this paper, Plantinga argues that believing in God can be rational without proofs of God’s existence. Natural theology is “the attempt to prove or demonstrate the existence of God” has a long history (49). Some Christians and mostly in the Reformed and Calvinist times rejected natural theology. One question was raised from this view: Why would Christians reject the attempts on proving God’s existence?

Read More

Confidence Vs Little Knowledge Essay

1395 Words | 6 Pages

Fideism teaches that rational or scientific arguments for the existence of God are fallacious and irrelevant, and have nothing to do with the truth of Christian theology because Christian theology teaches that people are saved by faith in the Christian God (i.e. trust in the empirically unprovable) and if the Christian God's existence can be proven, either empirically or logically, then to that extent faith becomes unnecessary or irrelevant. Therefore, if Christian theology is true, no immediate proof of the Christian God's existence is possible. Fideists assert that religious belief is based completely on faith – mystical experience, revelations and humanity’s need for the irrational all justify faith. One of the tenets of Fideism is “It is certain because it is impossible”.

Read More

More about Blaise Pascal's Argument For The Existence Of God?

Related Topics

Open Document